Star Fox: The Omega Chronicles: Book 1: Lylat Wars (New Version)
by Great Fox MK3
Summary: A revised edition of the first book in the "Star Fox: The Omega Chronicles" series. Fox has saved Dinosaur planet from destruction, but a new enemy will present itself and will test the skills of the Star Fox team. Secrets will be revealed and hearts will bond. A relationship will be tempered by the flames of war and a vixen finds her family. What will happen? Read on to find out!
1. Chapter 1

**Alright. The Omega Chronicles is getting a second wind. I decided to cut Halo out of the equation and make this a full on Star Fox story. I don't know why, I just feel as if the Halo was out of my forte. Anyway, I'm gonna be rewriting this completely. The old version is still going to be up, but I don't think I'll be updating it anymore. If anybody wants to try and finish it, then be my guest, just message me first and at least give me a sample of how you write so I can determine if I'm letting it into good hands.**

Andross began to quiver and shake, and his head began to morph into a grotesque ball of flesh before a flash blinded Fox, forcing him to pull the Arwing into a hard turn away. He hit the accelerator strip and pushed the engines to their limits, and even then he didn't know if it'd be enough. The flash grew brighter still as the primate scientist's head began to explode. Fox could feel the heat from the explosion nipping at his rear, even in the cold vacuum of space.

In orbit over Sauria, Fox had engaged the evil scientist-turned-emperor for the second time. He had followed him from the top of Krazoa palace on Sauria, knowing that if the primate escaped, he wouldn't be able to catch up to him, and the Lylat system would be doomed. Even as he accelerated away from the inferno left by the ape's death, the memories flashed through his head. He remembered the first time he had killed the scientist. He had destroyed his brain, and as a final attempt at killing the vulpine, he had self destructed, hoping it would kill Fox.

The Star Fox team commander had managed to outrun the explosion then only because his father – or what might have been the ghostly apparition of him – led him out of the same twisting tunnels that he had flown in to get there. He knew that if he made one wrong turn, he would meet a wall of flames – as well as his death.

The very thing almost happened several times, as he lost track of his father's Arwing more than once, but always managed to catch him just in time. He eventually followed him back to the entrance, and the last thing his father said to him stayed in his mind even at that very moment:

"You've become so strong, Fox." That was the last thing he had heard from his father before the Arwing banked away at the exit and disappeared.

Once he had rejoined the Great Fox and his team in space, he had looked for any sign of his father, his team getting worried about it. He had played it off as if nothing had happened.

Now, Fox saw the Great Fox lumbering towards him, heading away from the planet. He had kept the accelerator at the maximum, and the engines were beginning to overheat. He felt the seat, cold once again, engulfing him as the G forces had pushed him into the seat's leathery embrace. He had escaped Andross once again.

The pilot pulled the accelerator back and opened a radio channel to the Great Fox. "This is Fox, I'm heading into the docking bay." The vulpine looked to his left, seeing another Arwing floating lazily around the dreadnaught. It was Falco. He and Fox had gotten into a dogfight over Titania several years prior, leading Falco to leave the team and a scar left on their friendship.

Fox swung the blue and white interceptor into the aging capital ship's rear docking bay, which locked his ship down as soon as he had gotten it into place. The mechanical parts that assisted in storage folded the wings back and securing it to keep it from moving. A light blue shield came up over where he had just entered. It would allow Falco to enter when he wanted, but it would also allow Fox to leave his Arwing without fearing suffocation or being pulled out of the docking bay by the decompression when he opened his canopy...and it made it easier than closing and opening the large steel doors that would lock into place during transport.

Fox sat in his Arwing for a moment, reliving the battle he had just barely survived. The simian had emerged from Krazoa palace, hiding behind a large bust of a Krazoa. He had been playing Fox the entire mission. Fox had been there in an attempt to put the planet together, and upon seeing a beautiful vixen trapped in a large crystal, he had become mesmerized, almost instantly infatuated with her. The Krazoa spirits he had released had been floating around her, and all seven were needed to fix Sauria. Once he had released the last one, they all had entered the vixen's body, making Fox very worried. He heard himself yelling in his mind.

"What are you doing?! You said this would save her!" His cries fell on deaf ears as the Krazoa spirits had left her body by then and flown into the bust overlooking the palace. He had felt a rumbling sensation, and looking back to the crystal, he saw the vixen inside begin to shift. Fox's world slowed down as the crystal suddenly exploded. He dove forward and pulled his staff from his pack, quickly extending it and allowing the vixen to grab on before she fell to her death.

After he had helped her up, a blood curdling laugh had resounded from the bust, and the head detached itself from the body, beginning to float around the two foxes. "I am reborn...the mighty Krazoa god!" The same laugh once again filled the air. "Kneel all those that stand before me!"

Fox had begun pointing the staff at the floating head, knowing it wouldn't do much, but it was worth a shot anyway.

The vixen behind him made herself known. "We will never kneel to you!" Fox started to walk forward a bit, having put the staff back into his pack after realizing that it would be useless against this new foe.

The vixen lurched forward upon seeing the staff. "Give me that!"

Fox, annoyed and confused, turned to her. "Hey, wait!...well, thanks for nothing. If it wasn't for me, you wouldn't be standing here at all!"

The cerulean vixen ignored him, only feeling the staff and muttering one more thing. "My staff...you're back!" she said the second half with an air of victory, extending it and pointing it at the bust. She began to fire off fireballs from the tip, oblivious to the fact that they were doing nothing. The head began to float higher into the sky, creating a portal and backing through it. Fox shook his head in disbelief before running back to his Arwing and jumping in. He punched the ignition for the engines and started hovering off of the top of the palace, using the belly jets to suspend him as the engines gained enough power.

Once his gauges read green, he angled the nose up and shoved the accelerator strip forward, rocketing into the portal.

Once he had emerged onto the other side, he caught sight of the head, realizing he was in space once again. He opened a radio channel. "Great Fox, it's McCloud. Can I get some support over here? This thing's pretty big."

A robot filled his communications screen. It was the ship's navigation and control robot, ROB. ROB's monotone mechanical voice droned off his response. "Negative. Great Fox is incapable of firing the main cannons. Weapons are at 30%. Engines are at minimal working ability. Shields are-"

Fox cut him off, not needing to know what the dreadnaught's status was. If it couldn't bring it's cannons to bear on this enemy, he had no use for it at the moment. He caught up to the head, which then turned around, revealing two large hands, and behind those, a large purple face, covered in violet hairs. The monstrosity's eyes were a deep orange on the outer rims, with yellow irises.

Fox was shocked as it began to speak. "I've been looking forward to this day...to see you again, Fox McCloud."

Fox was barely able to speak as he realized that Andross had returned. He blurted out the only thing he could say by then: "Andross!"

The simian gave a toothy grin to his adversary. "Now...to destroy the Lylat system!" He brought his hands back over his face and turned around, allowing the Krazoa head to face the vulpine once more. Fox guessed that, if anything was like the first battle, he already had a plan.

He yanked the flight stick over, putting his crosshairs on the statue's minty green, blank eyes. As soon as the green crosshairs had turned red, he jammed down the firing studs, letting bright green twin lasers erupt from just under the wing joints.

Every time he scored a hit, they would flash a bright orange before returning to their original color. He felt as if it was the battle in Venom's core so many years before, but knew if he let himself get caught up in flashbacks, he'd be killed.

It didn't take much to destroy the eyes. When he did, he aimed for the single jewel on the bust's forehead, releasing a hail of laser fire at it before it was destroyed like the eyes.

The bust rotated to show Andross' face once more. Fox knew how to destroy him, and set to work on firing at the jewels embedded in the simian's palms. They would flash and change as they took damage before finally exploding. Fox thought he would do as he did the first time. He began aiming for the scientist's eyes, but when the lasers impacted and nothing happened, Andross began to laugh.

"You're a fool to think I would be stopped the same way as before." He began to laugh once more, his gaping maw filling Fox's canopy. The vulpine growled as Andross settled back down. However, he didn't have much time to react to the primate's next move.

Andross opened his mouth once more, sucking in asteroids and bits of space debris. He had done it to Fox the first time, and Fox had easily been able to roll and brake and escape the pull, but this time, the intake was so strong that no amount of braking or rolling would allow him to get away. Fox squeezed the flight stick as he prepared to face his death.

Suddenly, when Fox thought he was going to be destroyed, the intake stopped, and the simian screamed in pain as a flash of light erupted from behind him. Fox looked to the left, spotting a glint of white and blue. A radio channel opened up, allowing a blue avian to fill the screen. It was Falco, wearing a bandana on his head and a leather jacket. He was also sporting a pair of black sunglasses.

"Hey McCloud, different time, different planet, and you still need Falco's help." The falcon flashed a grin at his old teammate. "It's good to see ya buddy!" The ace rolled past Andross' head as Fox got set to fire again. Falco flew in between Fox and the ape, dropping a smart bomb off to him. "Fox, use this. It might help when he tries to suck you in again."

Fox nodded as he opened his cargo bay, allowing the bomb to settle in and get loaded into the bomb bay, ready to fire when necessary.

Little time passed until Andross decided to try again, not knowing Fox had a bomb ready for him. The ape opened his mouth once more and began to inhale, asteroids beginning to fly in again. Fox only had a small window before the asteroids got too plentiful to get a bomb through without it hitting one and prematurely detonating.

Fox aimed carefully and fired, hoping the bomb went where he wanted it. The little red light that flew from the nose flew straight and true, diving into Andross' gaping maw and exploding.

Andross' eyes widened, realizing he had made a mistake, but he quickly closed them as the pain from the explosion drove him into a fit of agony. His head became mostly transparent, leaving a blue outline of it as his brain was shown within.

Fox set his sights on the pulsing organ and jammed down on the firing studs, allowing a hail of green laser fire to pelt it, Falco pulling into a tight roll over Fox and forming on his wing only to do the exact same as his old friend.

It didn't take much before the transparent vision disappeared, replaced by the normal head. Andross shot a glare at the two as he realized that his brain had been mostly destroyed by the lasers. The primate only had time to yell before his face began to morph and expand before it self destructed.

"Hey, Fox, you awake in there?" Fox was shaken from his flashback, looking to the right and seeing Slippy, the team's mechanic, rapping a knuckle on the aging fighter's canopy.

"Yeah, I'm fine, just a flashback is all." Fox replied, unsealing the canopy and stepping down from the ship. "Where's Falco?" He inquired, wanting to know the ace's whereabouts.

Slippy shrugged, revealing he was just as clueless as Fox. "I don't know. He disappeared off radar...then again, our radar isn't that good in the first place."

Fox nodded, not saying anything. Had Falco disappeared again? Was he still angry about Titania? Fox didn't know, but decided he might as well forget it. No use in worrying about something that he had no control over.

Slippy patted the vulpine on the back. "Fox, don't worry about it. You did great out there...now come on, Peppy has General Pepper on the line, he's got some things to say to you about our payment." The toad didn't wait for Fox to acknowledge him, deciding to just push the vulpine out of the hangar.

Fox almost fell as the amphibian started pushing him. He was a little annoyed about it, but he knew the toad was right. He started walking, gaining a bit of space from Slippy's hand. The toad realized Fox had snapped out of his stupor and put his arm down. "You did great out there Fox...really."

The vulpine nodded once more. "Thanks, Slippy." The toad smiled a bit, seeing that his leader was coming back around to being himself.

"Hey, at least you don't have to run around that planet on your own anymore, right?" He asked. Fox looked down at the mechanic. Slippy didn't know it yet, but Fox was still thinking about the other Fox he had seen on top of Krazoa palace.

The vulpine shook his head as the two continued their walk, neither of them saying anything else. It didn't take long for the duo to reach the bridge doors, the heavy steel slabs sliding apart surprisingly quietly, despite the disrepair.

As Fox and Slippy entered, a chair turned around to reveal an aging, gray hare. Peppy smiled at the two younger members of the Star Fox team. "Welcome back, Fox." the hare said. He beckoned them closer with a wave of his hand.

The old hare pointed at the view screen at the back of the bridge, behind the captain's chair. A large, gridded circle with a ring around it and a small, red arrow in the middle of it as if it was flying around the circle was on the screen, blinking slowly.

Fox knew who it was and typed in a command on the small control panel on one of the arms for the chair. The blinking insignia on the screen faded to black, and then flashed, revealing an aged basset hound where the insignia had been.

The hound was beaming at them. "General Pepper here. Great work, Star Fox team. I received a message from the King and Queen Earthwalker...thanking you for saving their world." The hound was referring to the leaders of one of the tribes Fox had encountered on Sauria. The General thought for another moment, as if remembering something. "Oh, and Tricky says hi. I was, however, very surprised to hear that Andross was still alive."

Slippy nodded in agreement. "Not as much as we were, General. We thought Fox had put an end to him on Venom...but he somehow survived and came here."

Fox looked at Slippy and then back to the General. "It seemed that Andross discovered the ancient power of the Krazoa, and by trapping a blue vixen on the palace, who had the ability to channel this power, he was able to use this energy to revive himself."

General Pepper let out a sigh of relief, his smile coming back. "At least this time we'll see the last of him. I'm transferring your fee as we speak. Pepper out."

The screen winked off, Slippy letting out a cheer. "Yeah! Now we can finally repair the ship!" The toad heard a whirring of servos and clanking footsteps come from behind.

ROB moved his arms a bit, his servos whining a bit in protest. "And I really need some oil. These joints are not what they used to be," His robotic monotone only strengthening what Slippy already knew.

Fox had turned around by then, his sensitive ears having picked up a slowly growing noise, sounding like it was coming from the area that they had just come from. "...and I can't wait to get back with the Star Fox team." said the avian that appeared from it. Falco grinned from the doorway, stepping onto the bridge. "Hey, guys, you don't mind if I hang with you again, do ya?"

Fox looked at the falcon and crossed his arms and pretending to give it some thought before letting his arms down and smiling at his old wingmate. "Sure, Falco. It's great to have you back."

Slippy gave out another cry of joy. "The Star Fox team is back together again!" He grinned at Fox and Falco, the avian smiling at his team as he was welcomed back into the mercenary unit after so many years of being away.

Peppy looked out of the bridge window, seeing another ship fly by. "Oh, Fox! I almost forgot! I received this message from someone named Krystal." The hare pressed a few buttons on his own control panel, directing them to the view screen the General had disappeared from just as it winked back to life.

The same cerulean vixen from before came onto the screen, grinning at the team. "Hi, Fox, I really appreciate what you did for me. I'm just so sorry we didn't get much of a chance to talk." The team felt a thud as the ship that had passed by set down just inside the protective force field of the rear hanger. "I'm left with just one more thing to do..." The doors that Fox and Falco had come from split yet again, revealing Krystal. "...and that's to say thank you."

Fox's jaw dropped as he reached behind his head sheepishly. "Well, uh, okay." He realized he sounded a bit stupid, quickly correcting himself. "I mean, sure, no problem!"

Slippy let out a high pitched laugh. "You're not shy, are you, Fox?" Fox turned to give the mechanic a bit of a glare, but Falco jabbed the vulpine with an elbow, giving him a bit of a wink as Fox turned a bit red.

ROB made himself known once again. "My sensors indicate Fox's temperature is rising. Are you okay, Fox?" The robot had inadvertently let out the fact that Fox was heating up out of embarrassment.

Fox smiled and decided to just let it go as everyone, even Krystal, started to laugh. The two foxes looked at each other, both smiling. "Yeah, I'm gonna be just fine." Krystal and Fox looked away, shy, but quickly looked back at each other again, still smiling.

**Alright, end of the first chapter of the revised edition of Star Fox: The Omega Chronicles. I added about two pages and this time I kept the view on the Great Fox. Now, I look back at the original chapter and realize how much of a novice I was after taking a creative writing class. I feel as if I improved this one so much just in one chapter. If you guys have any opinions on this, just send a review and tell me how I did. Until next time – Great Fox MK3**


	2. An offer is made

**Hey guys...sorry for the long delay! I've been spending most of my tie making story boards and terminology, giving some characters back stories, making characters, doing some changes, etc. Basically, I've been making a sort of "story bible" that allows me to keep track of characters and their information. I used to keep it on my computer, but I've just gone to the pen and paper, and I work on it during school. Now: Changes for the story, first off. Damon has been renamed to basically just my name. I've added the person who's doing the editor jobs as well, and one other OC of my own that a friend requested. I've changed the story around a bit as well. Things will be a bit different and I'm planning on removing the original version so that nothing gets mixed up. Anyway, on to the story.**

The Great Fox lumbered through space, it's boosters just barely able to propel it towards the blue orb hanging in the black void just in front of them. Corneria, fourth planet of the Lylat System, was their destination and the home planet of the Star Fox team.

On the bridge, the team leader, Fox McCloud, looked over the control panels of the aging dreadnaught. Most of the buttons were starting to stick and over half of the main consoles and displays had either short circuited or just stopped working without warning. The team's mechanic and engineer, Slippy Toad, had done his best, but even his abilities with a wrench were limited.

The lime green toad rolled out from under a control panel on a rolling board and sat up, putting his hat back on. "Alright, that should give us just enough to get to the orbital docks that are sitting out there above Pomona City"

Fox looked down at his mechanic, sending a paw towards the toad to help him up. "Good job, Slippy". The toad stood up, brushing himself off. The team looked back towards Corneria, knowing they'd be lucky to make it to the space over the island that held Pomona City.

The planet disappeared as a screen dropped in front of it, showing a hail signal. Fox tapped in a few commands and the signal was opened, revealing a black vulpine. "This is General Marcus Ballard of the Cornerian Self Defense Force. State your business."

Fox typed in an authorization code and sent it to the General. The other vulpine's eye widened slightly. "Understood. Great Fox, you will be escorted to the dry docks over Pomona City. A shuttle will be waiting for you there."

The screen cut out, returning to it's position above the view screen. Four Cornerian fighters took up a formation around the Star Fox team mother ship, with one fighter on each of the four wings of the dreadnaught. The ships looked slightly different from what Fox usually saw over Corneria. They were newer models, it appeared. Fox pulled up the computer database and looked for the models. They were designated as the F-40 Valkyrie. Corneria had just introduced them before the team had last left the planet a few months before. It appeared that they had gone into mass production since then.

Fox and the rest of the team waited as the ship slowly lumbered to the docks, waiting for a smaller tug ship to come and pull them into place in one of the docks. The fighters peeled off as the Great Fox was fit into the maw of the orbital docks.

Fox stood from his seat as the ship was automatically powered down by the station's technicians remotely. Fox looked at his team, who were also beginning to stand up and stretch from the long voyage from Dinosaur Planet back to Corneria. Slippy was gathering his tools up and putting them back in a tool box. The ace pilot, Falco Lombardi, was looking lazily out the window, waiting for Fox to say they could all leave. Peppy Hare, an older rabbit who had served in the first Star Fox team with Fox's father, James, was checking a data pad filled with the maps of Dinosaur Planet's surface. Finally, the newest member of the Star Fox team, Krystal, was staring out the window beside Falco, a bit shocked at everything.

Krystal's planet, Cerinina, had been far behind Corneria in terms of technology before it had been destroyed, so all of this was very new to Krystal.

Fox walked over to the Captain's chair in the center of the bridge, picking up his data pad and comm link. He placed the comm ink on his wrist before going to ROB, the ship's navigational robot. "Alright, ROB, you're gonna need to power down for the repair process, alright?"

The robot nodded, his single red "eye bar" dimming to dark red, then brown, and finally black.

Fox sighed. He knew this was gonna take a while, and a good portion of the Dinosaur Planet job's paycheck to fix the aging ship. "Slippy, you're staying here to oversee the repairs, right?" Fox got a nod from the toad.

"Yep, that's right. Nobody knows this ship better than me, so why not?" Slippy gave his team leader a cheeky grin.

Fox returned the grin, looking back to the others. "Peppy, what about you?"

The hare stood up, cracking his back and limbs a bit to get rid of the stiffness. "General Pepper's gonna have me in debriefing for months with all of this intel. I'll need your data pad as well, Fox. Since you were actually on the surface for an extended period of time."

Fox gave the team's mentor his data pad and turned to the last two remaining members. "Falco, Krystal, what are you two going to do?"

Falco shrugged. "I don't know...I might have to go out for a while. It's been a while since I've been on Corneria."

Fox smirked. "You mean you're gonna go see Katt?" Fox was making a reference to Falco's long time, on-again, off-again girlfriend, Katt Monroe.

The avian's eyes widened slightly as Fox caught on to him. "No!" he retorted "I'm going to the nearest bar and getting hammered"

Fox continued to smirk, knowing the Falco's quick and loud defense of himself betrayed him completely. "Sure, sure. Tell Katt the team says hey".

Falco was fuming, but didn't reply. He only stormed off the bridge, leaving Fox and Krystal to talk while Slippy and Peppy gathered their things. Fox started the conversation. "So, Krystal, we need to get your stuff moved into the team's house on planet. You won't be able to stay here, after all."

Krystal looked away from the planet, stepping away from the window to give Fox her full attention. "It's all we really can do right now, right?" She received a nod from the vulpine. "Then let's get started."

Fox gave her a 'follow me' gesture, leaving the bridge, Peppy, and Slippy behind. The two foxes went through several winding corridors before arriving at Krystal's temporary room. Fox stepped out of the way to let Krystal put in the password to the automated lock. The vixen entered the password and a quiet beep was heard as it was accepted, the door sliding open without a sound.

The vixen moved into the room with Fox on her heels. She began putting her things in some boxes that were kept in the closets. "Thank you again, Fox, for saving me on Dinosaur Planet." She said, thanking Fox for what seemed to have been the hundredth time since the final encounter on Dinosaur Planet over a week before.

Fox smiled at the blue vixen, putting one of the boxes on the floor as she finished and began filling another. "It's no problem Krystal, I've told you this several times already."

"I know, Fox, but you saved my life, and the lives of every dinosaur on the planet. You deserve it." She replied, finishing the second box and handing it to him. She didn't have much else besides things that she could just leave on the ship.

"That's my job, Krystal. I'm happy that you're happy, but please, stop thanking me." He flashed her his trademark grin, letting her know that he enjoyed the thank you's, but that they weren't needed.

Krystal turned a bit red beneath her blue fur, but managed to turn and grab her staff off the small desk beside her bed, retracting it to it's smaller size and hoping he hadn't seen her blush.

"Alright, Fox, this is all of it." She said, watching him pick both boxes up.

"Now, we go to that shuttle the General promised us." He readjusted the boxes in his arms and led her back out into the hallways of the ship. The two foxes walked back towards the bridge, seeing Peppy and Slippy waiting for them next to an air lock. The hare's hand hovered near the button to open the inner door to the airlock. "All ready to go?"

The rest of the team nodded, Fox giving the signal to open up the airlock. When the door had closed behind them, the room began to equalize it's pressure with that of the dock's extended hallway back to the inside of the complex.

Eventually, a beep resounded in the tiny room, signifying that it was safe to open the hatch.

Fox led his team out into one of the main areas that led to several different ships and shuttles, all awaiting passengers and crew from all of the docked ships, both civilian and military.

One of the shuttles had a greyish white color to it, with a small fox on the side, a wing jutting out of it's back. The shuttle for the Star Fox team was waiting, with Falco impatiently leaning against it, tapping a foot. "Come on you guys! Hurry it up!"

Peppy sighed, walking slower than he had been before. He gave a small smile that the others could see, but Falco remained oblivious to it. The avian continued to tap his foot until the rest of the team had reached the shuttle door and entered it, with Falco taking up the rear.

Fox sat at the console and strapped in, starting the engines and feeling the rumble as they heated up to flight conditions. He turned around to make sure everyone was ready before he put a paw on the power strip and pushed it forward slowly, the shuttle lifting off in parallel with the amount of power being fed to it's engines.

Fox gently eased the flight controls forward and left, letting the shuttle drift towards the planet, increasing it's speed towards the planet off to the left. As soon as he cleared the dock's landing areas, he jammed the stick forward, sending the shuttle into a nose dive.

Fire began to pool around the nose of the shuttle, quickly turning into a cone of light and heat that enveloped the small craft. Fox heard Krystal grunting as she became uncomfortable due to the G forces. The rest of the team remained silent, save for Peppy trying to ease Krystal into her first shuttle based atmospheric reentry. She calmed down a few moments later, but not before the G forces began to decrease as most of the atmosphere had been covered in the few seconds that they had dropped like an oversized rock.

The vulpine began to level the craft out as they came closer to the massive ocean that covered Corneria, the Lavirana ocean.

Fox saw Corneria City, the planet's capital, rapidly filling up the window. He heard Krystal mutter something quietly to herself. "Amazing..." Fox smiled a bit, knowing that this was just the start.

Fox pulled back on the flight stick, watching the bottom of the artificial island that held the city up on stilts above the waves disappear, replacing the vast blueness with green grass and eventually high tech looking roadways. He saw cars flying high above the streets where pedestrians walked and went about their days.

Fox pulled high above the traffic that was at a height rivaling even the city's skyscrapers.

The control panel lit up and beeped repeatedly, demanding the vulpine's' attention. He typed in a few commands and opened the message. The same black vulpine from before, the general, was on his screen. "Star Fox team shuttle. You are to change heading to 035 and proceed in that direction until you arrive at the Ballastine. General Pepper wants all of you in debriefing."

Fox wondered who this really was. He thought that Corneria only had one general. This black fox was a little off, but orders were orders, and not even a famed mercenary questioned orders from more than one general.

He saw the same ships from before come alongside him, except this time, another came up in front of him, as if leading him along. It looked different. The ships he had saw at first were blue and gray, mimicking the Star Fox team colors almost, and would have succeeded if they had been blue and white. The ships looked a little bit like Arwings, but they were too slender and long to be an Arwing. They were interceptors. Nothing else could be that frail looking and be certified to fly. The wings were out to their sides, extended completely out, without being either forward swept or swept back like most fighters. They held position while the odd looking one stayed in front.

The odd one out was equipped with what looked to be a thick set of armor on the engines, with what seemed to be two heavy booster packs on the wings, faint blue blurs in the dark confines of the engine nozzles. Several smaller engine nozzles were embedded in the armored port, the main engines on low power with the smaller thrusters flaring every so often to keep its speed up. When the ship would move to the right angle, Fox could see a small insignia on the tail fins. It was what looked to be a small fox head, but it was angled from the side view. The silhouette of the head was black, and inlaid over a red five point star.

Fox had just gotten to memorizing the insignia when the ship peeled off, the others following it as the general came back onto the control panel's screen. "This is General Ballard. General Pepper is awaiting your team on landing pad number nine. Star Fox team, I hope to see you some time in the near future. General Ballard out." The screen went dark as the line was cut.

The vulpine looked down towards the Ballastine, seeing a large landing pad marked with a huge number nine painted on it in bright yellow letters.

Fox eased the accelerator strip back far enough to activate the hover engines, circling the pad and going into a soft descent. It was several seconds before the craft touched down and powered down. Fox unbuckled himself from the pilots seat, standing up and moving back into the main bay. "Alright, General Pepper is outside waiting. Let's not waste the General's time. Krystal, you can eave your stuff here, we'll be back."

The rest of the team unbuckled themselves from their crash seats, standing up and following their leader out of the shuttle into the bright light. Fox had to shield his eyes, but even then, he could see a pair of polished black boots with a bright crimson set of uniform pants stuffed inside. Fox quickly adjusted to the light and was able to look at the owner of the clothing.

The pants led up to a crimson jacket that matched the pants, a black belt with a golden buckle separated the two articles. As Fox made it to the torso, he could see four god chains connecting to both sides of the jacket where the opening was. The owner of the jacket had several rows of campaign ribbons and about a dozen shining medals that made little metallic sounds in the light breeze. Fox looked up at the owner. An aging hound wearing a pair of dark aviators and a large red officers cap with the hard black brim pulled down to cover the aviators a bit was revealed.

Fox realized who it was then, as only one person wore general colors as an everyday uniform, and that same person wore older style round aviators, rather than the newer slim type.

General Pepper gave the Star Fox team a warm smile. "Welcome back to Corneria, Star Fox." He said, sticking out a hand to the team leader, which Fox took and shook. The General took his aviators off, putting one of the ear pieces in a pocket on the jacket. His eyes were a bit droopy due to being basset hound like in appearance, but they still had the warmness that he greeted the team with whenever they met.

Looking back at the rest of the team, he could see familiar faces Peppy and Slippy, but he didn't expect Falco or the blue vixen with them. He knew that Falco had left the team after an incident on Titania a few years prior, but he had no idea who this vixen was. "So, Fox, you have girls fighting for you now?" Pepper gave off a smirk, picking at the vulpine.

"Actually, I'm not a part of the team. My name is Krystal." The vixen said, stepping forward and offering her hand to the officer.

Pepper took it, lightly encasing her smaller hand in his own large, gloved hand. "Then may I be the first to say that you've picked a fine band of people to travel with. My name is Pepper. I'm the Commander-in-Chief of Corneria's military and the head of it's government."

Krystal smiled at the old hound dog. "It's a pleasure to meet you, General."

Pepper grinned a bit, but decided that it was time to get down to business. "Now that we're all acquainted, I think it's time to get started on the matters at hand. The Dinosaur Planet crisis is over. We need a name. I'll also need the maps that Peppy has made for the cartographers to copy over. Fox's data from being planet side should also give us an inside look at the different tribes, their culture, species, and more. This is a gold mine of new information on what is out there on the outer edges of the Lylat System."

Fox nodded and turned to Peppy, reaching a hand out. The hare gave his leader the data pads containing the information, to which Fox gave them to Pepper. "Good. Now, we will get back to you on what we can do with these, but Fox, there is something I need to tell you." Pepper said, his face no longer happy and friendly.

Fox was a little puzzled as to what was wrong. "Of course, is something wrong, General?"

Pepper shook his head. "That's exactly the problem. Besides the Dinosaur Planet incident, we have had no real need for your team's services. Criminals have been laying low, and crime is at a record low across the system. Nobody wants to do anything with Star Fox patrolling the system. It's even more likely that crime will stop entirely once they know you're back at full strength with an ace pilot. We..." He stopped, thinking of his choice of wording. "...we have no need for your team in the foreseeable future, Fox."

Fox was a bit shocked. "You can't give us a job to patrol the system or anything? Any bounties on the table for us?"

Pepper shook his head again. "Even if we did, you wouldn't be compensated for very much. You'd be burning through your money even faster than now if you were active and not receiving enough credits to break even. However, Fox, my offer still stands. If you decide to take me up on it, then come see me here, and we'll work something out. It was good seeing you all again, and it was nice meeting you as well, Krystal." The General tipped his hat slightly before turning and moving back to the Ballastine.

Peppy moved to Fox's side. "Fox, what's the Genera talking about, an 'offer on the table'?" Peppy had an idea of what it was, but waited for his leader to answer.

"You remember after the Lylat Wars, when we returned to Corneria, how Pepper offered to lets us join the Cornerian military? He's talking about that." Fox bit his cheek, continuing. "Right now, we have enough money to repair the Great Fox and our ships, maybe get a complete refit, but either way our funds will be burned out really quickly, and with no good paying jobs from the military, we're pretty much screwed right now. I don't know. I'll think about what he said, and then we'll decide on what to do from there, alright?"

Peppy nodded, being the senior member on the team, and the mentor to the rest. "Alright ox, but it's your decision. You're our leader, and this is your team. We'll follow you all the way no matter what you pick."

Fox shook his head. "No, Peppy, it's our team. I'll get you guys' input on it tomorrow. I'll sleep on it. Let's just go back to the house and get Krystal moved in."

The team turned around, hooking back into the shuttle. Fox took his seat at the helm and pushed the accelerator strip up, the shuttle hovering off the ground before blasting off towards the Star Fox household on the other side of the city. The entire way back, the words echoed through Fox's mind.

"My offer still stands" repeated through Fox's head. True to his word, he would sleep on it, and talk to the General the next day. Solar, the system's sun, had begun to set on the horizon, coating the otherwise white shuttle in an orange glow. Fox was worried though, about what this would do to his team in the end.

**Alright, second chapter up. I feel as if I got the flow better this time around. What do you guys think? Drop me a review!**


	3. Fox's decision

**Time for chapter threeee~**

Fox rolled around in his bed restlessly. He was nervous about what would happen if he accepted General Pepper's offer. His team would be integrated into the military, but this wasn't what his father had wanted when he made the team. James McCloud, Fox's father, made the Star Fox team as a mercenary unit because he felt that pilots with a high skill rating should fly by their own rules, not have their talent stifled by rules and regulations.

Fox sat up in his bed and looked out of his bedroom window at Corneria City just a few miles away from team Star Fox's secluded Cornerian home. It kept the media away from them, yeah, but it also provided the team of mercenaries a perfect view of the city below, no matter the time of day. Fox tore his gaze from the window to look at the small LED alarm clock on his desk beside his bed. It read 4:29.

The brown vulpine groaned quietly to himself, lest he wake up anybody else in the house. Everything seemed louder, especially when one has ears as sensitive as a fox's. The mercenary commander flung his legs off the side of the bed, turning in place and setting his feet on the floor. He put some pressure on and lifted himself, stumbling a little bit due to the grogginess, but catching himself before he fell.

Fox walked to his bedroom door, every footstep causing the cold hardwood floor to jolt him awake after having left his warm bed. Fox opened the door slowly to avoid any chance of the hinges creaking. Of course, he had the money and technology to afford a very modernized home that could rival Corneria's elite, but he chose to leave the house in a more classical manner. It was far more characteristic of a rural house than having a high tech home in the middle of nowhere.

The vulpine stepped into the hallway, seeing several doors along both sides. Rooms were allocated for Falco, Krystal, Slippy, and if need be, Peppy and at least two other guests. He walked down the hallway quietly, his bare feet making soft padding noises as they touched the ground and came back up into another stride.

The vulpine turned right as he exited the hallway, making his way to a sliding glass door showing the same backdrop that his bedroom window had allowed him to see.

Sliding the glass door open, Fox stepped out onto a wooden veranda of sorts that was supported by several pillars underneath it, a ten foot drop if anybody fell over the railing. Fox leaned against the railing and stared at the city that was still coated in lights, lights that would burn all day and all night in a city of life. Corneria City was filled with highrises and skyscrapers, mainly providing a high ceiling, but also covered in smaller buildings, such as restaurants, salons, and other various shops. On one side of the city, there was nothing but darkness. Fox could see the stubby buildings, but knew that the residential district of Corneria City was filled with people that had to get up and go to work every morning.

Fox stood watching the residential district, seeing a few lights blink on, one by one, until they all had at least one light burning. The vulpine looked at the horizon, seeing a few orange rays of light peeking at the city and it's inhabitants. The Lylat System's sun, Solar, was just cresting the horizon to bring the day into motion. Fox saw the strings of traffic grow wider and longer, knowing that Corneria City's day was getting started. He didn't hear the door open behind him.

"So, can't sleep?" The voice startled Fox. He looked to his left, where Falco was leaning against the railing as well.

"No, I can't. I've got to weigh the decision Pepper gave us. I'm keeping my father's legacy alive by keeping this team going. It's all I have left of him. I can either let it be dissolved into the military and it be brought down like that, or I can let it go bankrupt and it'll die like that. I just don't know, Falco."

The avian listened to his leader's problem. "Fox, _you_ are your father's legacy." The avian wasn't joking around like he usually was. He wasn't acting cocky or arrogant. He was being serious. Fox hardly ever saw his friend like this, but when he did, he know Falco had good advice to give, so he let him continue. "Your father would want you to keep going, he would want you to do what's best for the team, even if it meant dissolving it. I mean, maybe it's not the best possible option, but right now it's our _only_ option."

Fox thought for a moment, taking in what the ace said. "Yeah...maybe you're right, Falco...thanks."

The falcon grinned and slapped Fox on the back, knocking the wind out of him. "That's our leader!" He crowed, making Fox thinking that Falco's enthusiasm would be the reason that woke everybody in the house up.

The vulpine smiled. "Shut your beak, Falco, or you'll wake up Slippy. You know how he gets when he doesn't get his 'eight hours of beauty sleep'" he said, smirking.

The avian shrugged, turning around and heading back inside. "Krystal and Slip-up are already awake. It's after 8, Fox. How long have you been out here?"

Fox's ears flattened against his head. "...Since around 4:30"

Falco groaned, shaking his head "Oh man, Fox. Get inside. You've been out here too long." With that, the avian slid the glass door open and walked back inside, leaving it open for Fox.

The red fox gave one more look at the city that was waking up after a long night and turned to the door, going back into the house where he saw Falco leaning on the door frame leading from the living room of their house into the kitchen, his arms crossed while he watched Slippy trying to help Krystal adjust to Cornerian life.

"Krystal, what did you normally eat for breakfast on your planet?" The mechanic turned and looked at the blue vixen, a box of cereal in his hand and several other breakfast foods strewn upon the counter. Fox guessed that he had tried to give them to Krystal and she didn't like any of them.

Falco leaned closer to Fox and whispered in his ear. "He's tried everything in the pantry that he can think of. He's about to pull his hair out."

Fox looked at the avian, an eyebrow cocked in questioning. "What hair?"

Falco smirked at Fox. "Exactly. He gestured back to the scene unfolding in the Star Fox team's kitchen, with Slippy calmly setting the cereal box down and leaving the kitchen without a word. The avian and vulpine watched the toad walk quietly up the stairs and disappear, a door shutting a few seconds after he left their sight.

They looked back at Krystal, who was still sitting at the kitchen table and staring at the vacant spot Slippy had left. Her ears had flattened against her head in embarrassment. Fox smiled a bit, taking a seat across from the rapidly reddening vixen, leaving a purple hint behind her blue cheek fur, with just a bit of pink emerging from the little area of white fur around her muzzle.

"Krystal, don't worry about it. Slippy just doesn't have too much patience when he comes to something he doesn't know the answer to." He gave her a reassuring smile.

The vixen looked up at Fox, a hint of a smile coming across her face. "Well...I'm not exactly the best with food. I've always been a picky eater. Some nights, I would go without food when the village hunters returned after a night's hunt with something I didn't like. My parents weren't too happy with me...but oh well."

Fox grinned at her, standing back up. "Well, what I _do _you like?" Fox began looking around the cupboards once more, noticing that Slippy had already pulled out most of the food and offered it to the vixen, but with no avail.

"I like fish, mainly, and berries, nuts, fruit...but that's about all that we ever got in my village." She stood up, her tail swishing back and forth every few seconds.

Fox looked at her for a moment, then closed the cupboards. "Alright, I guess it's time to go shopping. Falc-" The vulpine looked back towards the door frame where the avian had been waiting, but the blue bird was nowhere to be seen. "Well...he bailed on me."

Krystal's ears perked up. "Shopping? What is this...shopping?"

Fox looked back at the unfed vixen. "Shopping is where you go to a store of some kind and spend money to buy things."

"Like a trading market?"

Fox nodded, still trying to get used to the fact that Krystal had never been anywhere modern before. "Yeah, like a trading market." The vulpine smiled at her. "I guess I'll just take you then."

The vulpine cleaned up the kitchen and gestured for Krystal to follow him, leading her to the back door of the house and outside to where a medium sized steel building stood. He spotted the control panel next to a large metal door that had several folds in it. He typed in a few commands on the panel and stood back, the folding door lifting up and into the ceiling of the building.

Inside, three airships sat in the gloomy darkness of the hangar. Fox moved past the first two and set his eyes on the last one. It was sitting on a tripod of landing gear. The ship was painted white, with four large protrusions near the rear of the ship. The protrusions were setup to be an oceanic blue, with one on top and on bottom of each of the two wings. The craft was mainly gray, with a long nose easily twice the length of the cockpit and engines. The nose was rounded, with a small cargo bay inside the hollowed out nose. Between the protrusions were two holes the size of a basketball. These were the ships laser cannons. Typing in a few more commands, but this time on the small metal bracelet on his wrist, the ship let out a soft hissing noise, the canopy on top of it unsealing and opening. Fox saw a small set of steps extend from the hull just below the cockpit. He stepped up onto the first one, turning and offering a hand to the vixen.

Krystal stepped forward, taking Fox's hand and climbing up to be able to see into the canopy. When she looked inside, she saw a set of two seats. The one in front had a number of small buttons and controls, with descriptions in writing she couldn't understand. The back seat, however, had nothing in front of it. This was the passenger variant of the Star Fox team's signature fighter craft, the Arwing. The three currently in the hangar hadn't been upgraded yet, but would be sent into the workshop as soon as the Arwings on the Great Fox were refitted and redesigned.

Fox helped the vixen into the back seat, helping her strap herself into the seat after watching her fumble with the seat belt for a few minutes before pouting and giving up. He climbed into the front seat, pressing several command buttons and listening to the engines of the Arwing slowly spin up to operating levels. It wasn't as loud as Krystal had thought the fighter would be, but she hadn't seen a thing yet.

Fox pushed the accelerator strip forward very slowly, just giving it enough power to roll out of the hangar. He pushed one of the rudder pedals to the left, pointing the nose of the ship down a long clearing into the forest neighboring the home. In front of them, Fox saw the dirt floor of the clearing begin to split apart, a shinier, more high tech runway strip ascending from the depths. Nobody knew it, but underneath the Star Fox household was a large operating base rivaling the potential of Pomona Island Military Base. Fox waited until a set of running lights on each side of the runway appeared and started blinking in a sequence along the side off the strip, beckoning the ship to speed up and take off.

Fox planned to do just that, pushing the accelerator strip forward quickly, the engine slowly growing louder and louder until a the Arwing was screaming down the runway. Fox pulled back on the flight stick, causing the fighter's nose to lift off of the ground. As the craft angled itself up, it began to lift off the ground entirely. Fox pushed a button on the side of the strip, activating the Gravity Diffusers – the protrusions coming off of each wing – and felt the ship speed up and fly higher than before. The G-diffusers were creating a gravitational field around the ship that acted the opposite of normal gravitational fields. Instead of attracting things, the G-diffusers on the Arwing were making the craft almost weightless and allowing the engines to work at their max potential. A soft teal colored glow could be seen emanating from the rear of the ship, meaning the G-diffusers were working correctly.

Fox heard the engine grow louder as the fighter craft screamed through the sky, penetrating the cloud barrier and ascending into the bright blue skies of Corneria. Fox pulled the stick this way and that, giving off a few rolls, the wingtips on the Arwing writing lazy contrails through the sky.

In the back, Krystal was staring out the window, awestruck. She had never flown this high before. She had flown before on the backs of Cloudrunners, a flying dinosaur species on Dinosaur Planet, but they had never gotten this high into the sky.

Fox pushed the stick forward gently, letting the ship sink back through the clouds. Little droplets of moisture crowded the canopy as he emerged from the cloud bank. Pulling the stick to the right and inverting the craft, Fox heard Krystal yelp and start to panic as he did, the vixen thinking she was going to fall, but due to the gravitational field around the craft, she stayed in her seat. She continued to panic for a few moments before realizing nothing would happen.

Fox gave off an evil grin, pulling back on the stick and sending the fighter into a nosedive. Krystal started to freak out, screaming as the fighter plummeted towards the ground at a breakneck speed, with no sign of Fox pulling out of it. An alarm began to shriek, filling the cockpit with altitude warnings. Fox saw the altimeter drop. 10,000 feet, 8,000 feet, 6,000 feet, and it continued to drop. As the altimeter hit 1,000, Fox pulled the accelerator strip back to the near end, causing the G-diffusers to flare out, the airframe groaning quietly in protest to the sudden stop. Krystal continued to scream, with a smiling Fox turning around. "Krystal...Krystal!...KRYSTAL!"

The vixen stopped screaming, looking around and seeing that she wasn't dead. "...yes Fox?"

The vulpine grinned and turned back around. "I hope I didn't scare you too much." Looking outside the canopy, Fox could see several other animals on the street, all of them looking at the fighter craft that had it's nose just a few inches off the ground.

_** (Transition)**_

Fox landed the Arwing back inside the hangar and extended the cargo bay, jumping out and helping Krystal out of the craft. Moving to the front of the ship, the vulpine reached under and pulled out several plastic bags, loading all of them onto his arms for one trip before remotely closing the bay. He began to trudge back to the house, burdened by the bags. Krystal followed him, giggling a bit with her tail swishing slowly as she watched him struggle a bit, amused.

Fox turned to her as he reached the door, waiting for her to open it, as his hands were full. Krystal couldn't figure out why he was waiting, cocking her head for a few seconds before realizing. "Oh!" She ran forward, opening the door for Fox with yet another giggle.

Fox passed by her, his ears flattened against his head, muttering a thank you as he trudged inside to set the groceries in the kitchen.

Once the two foxes had put away all of the food, Fox looked at the clock in the kitchen. It was noon. He turned back to Krystal. "Alright, now that we have some actual food that you may like, I need to go and speak to General Pepper. Slippy should help you with anything you need, and if he fails at even that, then I'll come back and help, alright?"

The cerulean vixen nodded, smiling. "Alright, thank you." Fox returned her smiled and went back outside, going back towards the small hangar. This time, he went for a single seat variant of the trademark fighter. It was virtually identical to the one he had flown in with Krystal.

Climbing inside, he rolled the craft out onto the runway once more, waiting for the strip to move itself into place before pushing the accelerator strip forward. The blue and white fighter screamed down the runway before lifting off and banking towards the direction of Corneria City.

Fox set his sights on one of the larger buildings. It was more of a tower than a building. It was the office building for Corneria's aristocratic leadership, and it was living up to it's sky scraper design name. A few wispy clouds could be seen just above the top floor, splitting and thinning out as they impacted the top of the building and it's comm tower on top of it. Fox saw a small landing pad jutting out of the building about halfway up.

Pulling the accelerator strip back far enough for it to go into hover mode, Fox began circling the building, slowly lowering the power being fed to the hover jets. The Arwing began to lower itself gradually onto the landing pad as it completed it's third encirclement of the building. Hydraulics hissed in protest as the fighter's weight pushed down against the landing gear's shock coils.

Fox unsealed the canopy and hopped out, making his way towards a set of double glass doors. The red-brown vulpine pushed one of them open, heading straight for an elevator at the end of the hallway he entered into, a ding sounding off as an elevator stopped at that floor. The doors split open, allowing several other animals to file out and go about their duties. Fox stepped in and pushed the button for the top floor.

As the doors closed, he heard the music in the steel box grow in volume. Fox looked at the floor designator, seeing the number rise every few seconds. It was agonizingly slow, considering he was only on the 49th floor, and the floor he wanted was floor number 70.

Fox waited for what seemed like forever before the doors finally opened. Looking up, he saw the red number 70, and finally got to leave. He had stepped into what appeared to be a reception room. A light brown minx was sitting behind the desk, typing away on a laptop computer. Fox walked over to the desk, waiting for the minx to notice him

It took a while, but Fox eventually cleared his throat, startling the receptionist. "Oh! I'm sorry! I was finally getting into enjoying my work for once and...I guess I just lost track of the outside world." She said, laughing a bit.

Fox smiled at her. "Don't worry about it. I have an appointment with the General. Is he busy right now?"

"One moment, Mr...?" The minx looked at her computer, her eyes swiveling to look him over. "Wait...aren't you...Fox McCloud?"

Fox nodded, his ears flattening a bit. "Yes, that's me...I knew that at least one person would recognize me. Nobody else did, and for once, I'm not being hounded by people wanting autographs or pictures."

The minx grinned. "Oh, of course. I can understand why. Your team is always on the news, and by now, I would have gone crazy." The minx looked back at her computer, typing a bit more as she searched for her schedule for the day. Fox noticed she had a name tag. It said 'Lauren"

Fox waited a bit longer before she managed to pull it up. "Well, look at that, right on time, Mr. McCloud." She picked up the small telephone on her desk. "General, Fox McCloud is here to see you." a slight pause. "Yes sir, I'll send him in right away." She put down the phone, a click being heard as it settled into place. "Mr. McCloud? The General will see you now."

Fox nodded, thanking the receptionist and moving to a set of double oak doors. He pushed one of them open, seeing the old hound dog that had met his tea on the landing pad outside of the Ballastine. He was sitting behind a desk made of the same wood that the doors had been carved from. Papers were scattered across the table, with the General looking from one to the other, signing them after reading for a few moments and placing them in a set of trays with either accepted or denied on them.

Fox shut the doors, a very audible click resounding through the room that had been otherwise quiet save for the scratching of a pen and the shuffling of papers. The General's large, floppy ears twitched, causing him to look up. "Ah! Fox! It's good to see you again." The General stood up, walking around his desk and offering his hand to the other canid.

Fox took it, shaking it. Pepper began to move back to his desk, sitting down behind it once more and gesturing for Fox to take a seat across the desk. Fox did so, deciding that it'd be best, as this might be a long meeting. Pepper sat back in his own chair, causing it to squeak as he crossed his hands on top of his desk. "So, Fox, what is your decision on the matter at hand?"

Fox sat forward, letting his elbows down on his knees and supporting himself against them. "...I'm taking you up on the offer to integrate into the military...but can I make one request?" The General sat forward as well, motioning for Fox to go on. "I want to be able to keep my tea together. If we were split up, it wouldn't do anything but make us worse."

Pepper cocked his head. "That's it? That's all you request? Then of course! I was thinking you'd want something more. Of course you can stay together. I'm glad you decided on that. I had a few things set aside in case you decided to take me up on the offer. Your team will be given officer ranks in the Cornerian Joint Command unit, meaning that you will be part of the Army, Navy, and Air Force. Also...the blue vixen, Krystal, isn't it? She is part of your team...right?"

Fox hesitated. "I don't know just yet...but if it's all the same, until she says that she isn't, I'm considering her as part of team Star Fox."

Pepper slowly nodded. "Alright. Then take these." Pepper reached into his desk, pulling out a small box. He slid it across the desk to Fox.

When the vulpine picked it up and opened it, he saw several things. Four sets of small, metal plates were set in the velvet. Each of them said Fox McCloud, Slippy Toad, Falco Lombardi, and the last one said just Krystal. Fox saw smaller insignia just above them. Over his tag was a pair of silver oak leaves, the word "Lieutenant Colonel" posted just below them. Falco's dog tags had a golden oak leaf above them, signifying his status as a Major. Slippy's dog tags had a set of dual silver bars, held together by smaller bars connecting them at the top and bottom. The toad was a Captain. Finally, ox looked at Krystal's. A pair of golden bars sat above her tags. She was a Cornerian Second Lieutenant right off the bat.

Fox closed the box, sliding it into his jacket pocket. He looked back up at the General, who was now smiling a bit.

"Well, how does it feel...Lieutenant Colonel McCloud?" The General grinned at his new brother in arms. Fox's days as a mercenary were over, and his life as a professional soldier were just beginning. Yet again, Fox was wondering: _Have I made the right choice? I hope so._

**There's another chapter churned out. Hope you guys are enjoying these longer, more defined chapters. Until next time!**


	4. Meeting the Brass

**I feel as if I'm finally out of that rut I was in for so long. I'm enjoying writing this story again. Anyway, on to chapter 4!**

Fox looked around, making eye contact with the rest of the Star Fox team. Krystal, Falco, and Slippy had been called into the living room of the Star Fox household, waiting for whatever their leader had to tell them.

Fox spoke up. "I'm sure you guys know why you're here. I took Pepper up on his offer. However, he's letting us stay together as a team. He values our unit structure, and knows that breaking us up wouldn't do very much to help us. He gave me these."

The vulpine pulled the little black case that the General had given him before, opening it away from them, as if he was trying to hide it. Pulling out Falco's tags and the major insignia, he handed them to the bird, who clasped them in his wings, looking them over. Next, he gave them to Slippy, the new captain grinning at his insignia, and finally, he slipped his own tags over his neck, leaving the lieutenant colonel's oak leaves in the velvet impression.

Fox turned to Krystal. "Now, on to a more pressing matter. Krystal, so far, I've been considering you as a member of the team, as I had no other knowledge of what you were going to do. So, I'll ask you now: Do you want to stay with the Star Fox team, or do you want to part ways with us?"

The vixen looked down at the floor, her ears flattening out. "I have nowhere else to go...but I don't wanna be a burden to you guys..." The team could tell that Krystal was embarrassed about the situation. Fox opened his mouth to say something, but he was cut off when something dark blue entered his peripheral vision, heading straight for the vixen.

A blue feathered wing landed gently on Krystal's shoulder, causing her to look up. Falco smiled down at her. "Hey, cheer up blue. You're not what I'd call a burden...and that's something coming from me, since I've been saving Slippy's ass for almost a decade." He smirked as he heard the toad grunt. The ace ignored it, still keeping his eyes locked with Krystal's

"So, you wanna join this team or not, lady?" Krystal had known Falco for just under a month, but she could tell that it wasn't very often that Falco did this for anyone. It was partly because of her mind reading powers, and partly because it wasn't hard to lock onto people's feelings and behavior for the azure vixen.

Krystal thought for a moment before breaking into a huge smile and embracing the falcon, almost knocking him down from the force. "Hey! You're messing up my feathers!" the avian said, but he smiled a bit, returning the hug. Fox and Slippy stood a few feet away, watching as the Star Fox teams most cocky and arrogant pilot melted a bit for the newest and first female pilot.

Falco and Krystal eventually let go, turning to Fox. "I'm gonna join the team, Fox, if that's alright?"

The brown vulpine flashed his trademark grin, showing a mouthful of white fangs and giving her a thumbs up. Slippy did the same, but it just creeped her out a bit. Fox realized what was going on and turned to see the toad.

"Slippy? That's a little...creepy." Fox said, scooting closer to the others.

When the toad had gone back to his normal face, which was now scowling slightly, Fox grinned. "Alright, Team Star Fox is now back at full strength!"

_Fox sat in the slightly uncomfortable chair in the waiting_ room outside of General Pepper's office. He heard keys clacking nonstop on the receptionist's keyboard while she talked to someone on the phone, most likely a friend of hers with a chunk of gossip for her to chew into.

The vulpine sighed and sunk back into the chair, closing his eyes for a few seconds. However, as soon as he got comfortable, he heard the receptionist call his name.

"Mr. McCloud? The General will see you now." Fox groaned to himself, quietly so the receptionist couldn't hear. He opened his eyes and stood up, nodding to her before entering Pepper's office.

It was still early in the day, so the wall of glass at the opposite end of the room still showed the Corneria City skyline. The sky over the capital was still a light pink. In the short walk from the door to the chair in front of Pepper's desk, Fox thought about what had happened the day before. Pepper had given him the rank insignia for the team, he had informed them about what was going on, and Krystal had been inducted as the first female member of the team.

The General was doing the same thing he had done when Fox had last come in. Pepper seemed to have an unlimited supply of ink pens, as in the trash can next to his desk; there were already dozens of empty pens from him signing so much. Fox cocked an eyebrow and cleared his throat.

The hound's ears twitched and caused the General to look up. Pepper smiled, sitting up to place his back against the backrest of his leather chair. "Well, Fox, what were your team's thoughts?" Pepper placed his paws on his desk, locking his fingers together.

Fox took a seat across from him, leaning forward and placing his elbows on his knees for support. "They all took it better than I thought they would. Even Falco managed to stay serious for a few minutes."

Pepper chuckled, taking his paws off of his desk. "Good…Good." The hound stood up and faced the window behind his desk, gazing upon the skyline. "Fox…I have reason to worry that we may need the skills of you and your team once more very soon."

The vulpine's ears perked up, listening to the General as he went on. "Andrew Oikonny is amassing a large battle group in orbit over Fortuna. I think he may be trying to start another war. I've sent a stealth corvette to do a recon mission. They've hidden behind the planet's third moon, Bampa. They've gone dark and they've been using docking thrusters to stay out of the enemy line of sight. Sensors can't detect them now, but I don't know how long they'll be safe. I've ordered them to remain on station for another 24 hours while I get the 5th fleet ready to mobilize. Right now, I want your team on standby, as I don't know if you're prepared to operate in a three man formation. Is Krystal ready to fly?"

Fox thought for a moment, taking it in. "Damn, dirty ape…General, I don't know if I can train her in time for a skirmish of that size. Even for us, it's hard to stay our best in a fleet size battle. Even Peppy and Falco had a hard time during the skirmishes in Sector Y and when we attacked Area 6 during the Lylat Wars. I can try…but I'm willing to fly without a fourth wing. I'm not bringing Peppy out of retirement when he just started. When is the fleet going to engage Oikonny's forces?"

Pepper turned to a laptop on his desk and typed in a few keys, watching the screen for a moment. "My commanders are sending in reports every half hour of their ready state. Right now, we're still getting the ships recalled so they can be resupplied, re-staffed, briefed, and refitted if need be. I estimate that we won't be even close to ready for at least another two weeks. Fox, I want you to train Krystal for that time. If she feels ready and you allow her, I want her participating in the skirmish. I read your report on her. The telepathic abilities she has would be invaluable in the field, even more so if Oikonny has stealth ships. Now, it's up to you in the end, but it's also going to be best if you train her now, so she'll be ready in case of an emergency."

Fox nodded. "I understand, General. Falco and I will start flying with her. I'll get Slippy to make a few simulator courses and Peppy can start planning for when we actually get her in the air. If I'm correct, she can learn things almost immediately by reading someone's mind. She picked up our language before she stepped foot on the Great Fox back over Sauria. I asked her and she said that reading someone's mind, she can learn things as if it's second nature. The Arwing may be the same for her."

Pepper nodded. "Also, Fox, for the Fortuna mission, you'll be working on your own, but you'll be part of a squadron led by Brigadier General Marcus Ballard. He may be upper brass, but his morale boosting abilities and field command skills are almost at par with yours. When he's on the battlefield, it inspires our troops almost as if Star Fox was in the fray. You won't be required to take orders from him, but do try to take some advice if he gives it. He fought in the Lylat Wars as well, holding the line on Corneria. That's why the capital wasn't immediately leveled. He had a kill score that almost rivaled yours. You can find him on Pomona Military Base."

Fox remembered the name from the flight lead that had escorted his team down to the Ballastine when they first met Pepper after returning to the planet. "That reminds me; I thought we only had one General at a time."

Pepper waved his hand dismissively. "Oh no, Fox. We have several, but I'm the only five star General. If I was the only high commander, our fronts would all collapse very quickly and we wouldn't stand a chance in battles."

Fox sat back in his chair. "Fair enough. Is that all you need to tell me, General?" The vulpine stood up, waiting to see if Pepper had anything else for him.

"That will be all, Fox. Meet with General Ballard before the week ends, you'll want to get to know him if he's to work well with you."

The vulpine nodded and stood. Turning to head for the door, as soon as Fox's paw touched the nob, Pepper stopped him once more. "Fox." The vulpine turned to face the superior officer. "Take care of her, Fox. Don't let her get hurt."

Fox's eyes widened a bit before he realized what the General meant and nodded, turning the knob and leaving the office. Pepper sat back down in his chair, a sigh escaping his muzzle. "I hope that boy isn't as reckless as he was during the Lylat Wars." Sitting there for a moment, he let himself just relax. It was rare that Pepper got to just sit there, due to the amount of papers. He thought about what he had said to the still young McCloud. Looking across the room to beside the door, he saw a picture of a rabbit, in his mid-30's, as well as himself when he was younger, and between them was a Fox about the same age as the hare, give or take a few years. The two canines wore aviators, the young Pepper wearing the larger, more classic aviator style sunglasses. The vulpine wore the slimmer, new variant. The three of them were grinning against a backdrop of Corneria city. It was James McCloud, Peppy Hare, and then Sergeant John Pepper. That picture had been taken twelve years ago to the day. It was taken the day before the original Star Fox team had left to assault Venom, with only Peppy Hare making it back. Pepper let out another long sigh before picking up another pen and going back to his work.

_Fox felt the Arwing bounce a bit as the shocks in the landing_ gear absorbed the weight of a fighter setting down on the landing pad. Fox pressed a few buttons on the main panel, causing a small set of steps to emerge from the side to allow him to get out, as well as the cockpit unsealing and lifting up to allow him out.

The vulpine stood up, easing over the side of the cockpit pod and putting his foot on the first step, guiding himself down. Fox stepped all the way off, letting the stairs slide back into the hull and the cockpit closing.

Pomona Military Base was the third largest on the planet, behind only Corneria City's in second and the Ballastine in first. Fox turned away from the Arwing and started towards the control tower and terminal to enter the base. A dog soldier was waiting for him.

When Fox approached, the German Shepard removed his aviators and stuck his hand out for Fox's ID. "Fox McCloud…mercenaries are allowed on base now?" the dog asked, lifting an eyebrow as he handed the ID back.

Fox shrugged a bit, looking sheepish. "Actually…Star Fox isn't a mercenary unit anymore. We've joined the military."

The Shepard, whose uniform nametag read "Lambert", nodded in understanding. "Understood…" He tilted his head to look at the ID still in Fox's hand, his eyes widening a bit as he noticed the silver oak leaf cluster for the first time. The Shepard quickly brought his heels together and snapped off a salute. "Understood, sir!"

Fox, although not in an official uniform by now, only still wearing the green flight suit and silver vest from the Sauria mission, decided to render the salute with one of his own. "At ease, Lambert."

The dog nodded, dropping his salute. "Colonel…it's just a security measure, but I'll need you to sign in on the sheet and give your reason for being here." The dog moved to the side, showing a data pad and stylus with a chart on it.

Fox moved forward, signing his name and explaining why he was there. When he finished, the Shepard looked at it and cleared him, swiping his ID card and saluting once more. "Have a good day, Colonel. You'll find General Ballard in his office on the top floor of the main building."

With a word of thanks, Fox made his way towards the largest building on the base. The building was easily seven stories tall, and was long enough and wide enough to hold the Great Fox and then some.

Fox headed for a door that said "Elevator" above it, walking in and punching the number 7. The ride was fast enough with the elevator being a new model that was pushed in an antigravity chamber, much more advanced than the older models still pulled by cables. The vulpine seemed to step in and then back out in seconds.

The sign on the wall as soon as the doors opened told him where he was. He eyed the top name on the list, seeing "Commander Rooms". Fox saw a list of the on base commanders, starting at company command and moving up to installation commander. The General's name was at the top of the list, with officer number 709 next to his name.

Looking at the door next to it, Fox could see "701" in bold black lettering on the frosted glass window. Turning to follow it, he only had to walk about thirty feet to find the General's office. Knocking on it, he heard a gruff "Come in". Stepping inside, Fox came muzzle to muzzle with his new commander and fellow officer.

General Marcus Ballard was a jet black fox, not unlike McCloud himself. A scar ran down the length of his face, starting from his forehead, down through the center of his left eye, and to just above where his jawline started. His eyes were both in working order, however. It must have been a shallow cut, as if it wasn't he would have lost his eye. The alternative was that he had gotten an artificial eye, but they were costly. Fox would ask him eventually. The vulpine wore the newer rendition of the Cornerian Air Force uniform. The navy blue jacket held row upon row of campaign ribbons, a rainbow decorating the left side of his chest. Above them, Fox could see the aviators' wings given to all military pilots on the General's chest. The General had several medals below the ribbons. He could see a badge with a long black fox on the left shoulder, its body becoming a blur past the middle to where its tail would be, leaving a trail of fire behind it. The patch signified that he was in the 297th Tactical Fighter Squadron "Inari". Fox also took note of the four shining stars on his shoulders.

Fox thought of what to do, but then remembered the airman that had given him directions when he landed. Imitating Airman First Class Lambert, Fox snapped off a salute, but it could have been better. General Ballard stood up, slowly bringing his own paw up to his face before dropping it. "At ease, Colonel McCloud. I've been expecting you. General Pepper has already sent me the paperwork. Sit down, please."

Fox sat down across from the General. It seemed that every high ranking officer on Corneria had a seat in front of their desk. Fox sat with his back against the chair, attempting to remember all of the military baring he was taught at the academy over a decade ago. He hadn't used it since then, and it showed.

The other vulpine gave Fox a glare that looked as if Fox had pulled a gun on him, but suddenly burst into laughter. Waving his paw to McCloud in a gesture, as if telling him to stop, he managed to control himself. "Relax, Colonel. You're fine. I don't need you sitting as if you're a robot all the time. Relax." The black furred commander stuck his paw out, waiting for Fox to shake it. "I'm Brigadier General Marcus Ballard, commander of Pomona Military Base and the leader of all air and space single ships for the Fifth Fleet." Fox reached forward and grasped the General's paw, shaking it and letting him continue.

"John Pepper sent me all of the information and what to expect. I hear that you and your team have been assigned to my command. I know how you work, and there is a military chain of command, but you answer only to me and whoever else I tell you to. Simple enough?" Fox nodded, already liking this new General's way of running things. "Good. This also means that Pepper has told you about the fleet amassing to take the fight to Oikonny over Fortuna. They're mostly remnants of Andross's forces and a veritable army of scattered mercenaries. It's amazing what the offer of a buck can make people do. We've been able to slip things into the extranet and make it look like a leak about the fleet amassing. We hope it'll make Oikonny rush to put his forces together and hopefully mess things up in his haste. Our stealth corvette has already seen about a tenth of his forces have turned and ran away. They know that if Corneria's gunning for them, they're bound to lose, especially since they can guess that we'll have Star Fox on our side."

Fox put his elbows on his knees, propping his chin up on his hand, listening to the General. Marcus continued, giving Fox another briefing about the battle to come. "Now, you'll most likely launch into battle if we need you. John has said that you're a pilot short of a squadron. Do you think you'll be ready to take a fleet on like that?"

Fox nodded once more. "Of course. We _are_ the Star Fox squadron, after all." Fox grinned at the black vulpine. "We'll be ready, General. If we have to, we'll fly a three wing squadron."

The General nodded and stood up, moving around the desk and leaning against it. "Good, I'm glad to hear it. Now, Oikonny has a fleet full of mainly destroyers and light cruisers, with battleships mixed in here and there, and a few dozen carriers. The cruisers and destroyers number in at about 70 to 80 percent of the fleet, meaning there are about 500 to 600 of them, give or take. The battleships make up anywhere from 10 to 15 percent. This is a rough estimate of about 100 or so, and the carriers make up the rest. There are less than 50 carriers, but all of them will be loaded to the brim with fighter squadrons, mostly filled with untrained or weak willed mercenaries. They should be easy pickings for us. Oikonny will have his flagship somewhere near the rear. We've gotten word that it's a special ship. It doesn't have a specified class, but the ship will be designated as a heavy cruiser. There's not much to really say about it right now besides the fleet strength and when we mobilize. For the time being, go home, get your team together, and train that fourth person, understood?"

Fox stood up, nodding. "Understood General." The orange-brown fox saluted, his black counterpart doing the same thing. When they dropped the salute, Marcus reached his paw out, waiting for Fox to take it. "It was good meeting you, Colonel McCloud. Good luck training your team." Fox took the General's hand, shaking it

Fox smiled. "It's appreciated, sir." With that, he turned away from the other vulpine and exited the office, turning and heading for the elevator. Fox knew now that training Krystal for the upcoming battle would become one of his priorities to make sure she was ready for it.

**Alright, finally done with this chapter. Sorry for the long delay. I've been back in a state of writers block and I was without internet for a month. Anyway, I hope you guys enjoy this chapter, and I'll try to make the gap between now and the next one shorter. Also, who can guess why I chose Inari as General Ballard's squadron name? Leave your answer in the reviews! Until next time!**


	5. Skirmish over Fortuna

**You know something? It's rare to get any reviews until a few days after I post something. When I get three reviews the day I post a chapter and one of those people is one of my favorite Star Fox authors on FF (General Whitefur), it really makes me feel good about my writing. Thanks for the reviews you guys! Stallion 6 was correct in Inari being the Japanese fox god, and I'd like to specially thank K.S. Reynard for her long, informational review. I love when people give me feedback on the story, and I especially love when they give me feedback how to improve my writing in general. Again, thanks guys!**

_Fox's right paw, previously resting on the flight stick_ that sat on the right side of the Arwing's console, jerked to the left quickly, sending the fighter into a high rate aileron roll, the inky black void of space and the pinpoints of light that were stars spinning in his vision. A shining magnetic field encased the fighter and deflected the heavy red laser blasts off into the void. Fox looked down to the scanners, seeing that there was an enemy ship behind him, an Arwing class interceptor. He pulled back on the stick with his right paw, using his left paw to pull back on the accelerator strip that was opposite the flight stick. With his boosters now completely cut, he used the Star Fox team's signature fighter's high maneuverability to face directly back at the enemy fighter.

Bringing his left paw down to the command console, his furry digits were a blur as he typed in commands to reroute power from his boosters to the forward shields. Leaving the paw where it was so he could quickly reverse the new commands, he began jamming his fingers down on the bright red firing studs on the side of the flight stick, sending a stream of bright blue twin lasers at the incoming Arwing.

One of the lasers made contact with the fighter's wing, sending it off balance and making its trajectory waver. Several more shots hit, impacting the main fuselage. Each round that hit would cause the fighter to buck this way and that, sending ripples in each direction on an invisible barrier as the ship's shields began to lose massive amounts of power from the barrage. The transparent shield began to turn red, showing ripples on the surface before disappearing entirely as the shielding failed. Fox fired a few more rounds, blowing the left wing off and the top right G-diffuser manifold from its housing.

Completely unbalanced with its shielding down, a wing missing, and the G-diffuser system trying and failing as it overcompensated for the loss of a manifold, the fighter began to spin out of control.

Taking careful aim, Fox pressed down on the firing stud once more, sending the bright blue laser into the cockpit and killing the pilot inside instantly. Fox grinned as the world went white around him.

_ Fox stepped out of the virtual reality _machine, hearing it hiss as steam erupted from the vents in the sides. Fashioned to look like the shell that encased fighter cockpits, the virtual reality machine was designed to train pilots in a fighter environment, but made it to where beginners could fly without the risk of losing a fighter. Fox looked around the plain white room, which had two walls dedicated to housing the VR machines. On the two walls, there were two machines each, and on one wall, there was a laptop embedded in the wall, displaying "New Record" in bold red letters. Fox approached it, hearing another machine settle on its shocks and steam erupt from its vents.

He clicked a few times on the track pad for the laptop, looking at the readouts that the mock battle had given them. It showed statistics like remaining shield percentage, usage of resources, accuracy and shots fired, the battle time, and more. Fox looked at his statistics as Falco walked up behind his team leader, complaining. "I would have won if you hadn't pulled that dirty little trick and turned around like that. Who does that right in front of an asteroid belt?"

Fox smirked, checking his scores. Falco was right. Had Fox never seen the asteroid field he had been coming up on before Falco opened fire and revealed himself, he would have lost the battle. Fox knew that Falco would throw it all on the table and had hut his engines off, leaving himself to drift towards the asteroids at a high speed. When he did this, the avian hadn't expected it, but had been too slow in reacting to really perform a counter-attack against Fox. "Quit your whining, Falco, you know I won fair and square."

The vulpine's eyes raked over his shielding. He had only had twelve percent remaining in his shield bars, while Falco had none. Had the avian managed to hit Fox on the sneak pass, he would have finished the vulpine off. Fox had just barely managed to get out by the skin of his teeth.

The ace pilot continued to complain either way. "Whatever, I'm going back to the house and watching tv. Tell m when you need me." With that, the falcon turned and left the simulator room, going back to the surface to enter their home.

Fox turned back to the laptop and scrolled back in the battles for the week. He made sure to check over the battles that Krystal had fought against the rest of the team. She had gone against Slippy first, with the toad being the easiest adversary on the team. She had almost completely destroyed the toad in their dogfights. It seemed her telepathy was a sort of cheating device. The first few battles had her learning the controls and what they did, but every battle showed her efficiency improving.

After she managed to perfect her dogfighting against Slippy, she had gone on to go toe-to-toe with Peppy, who had been an ace pilot back in the days of the original Star Fox. Peppy, however, wasn't as good as he had been. With age, the hare's piloting had degraded over the years. Peppy was by no means an easy fight, but he wasn't as good as Fox or Falco. Krystal had quickly made short work of the team veteran. Since then, she had quit flying, waiting for Fox to tell her who she would go against next.

The two aces had gone against each other a few times, with Fox coming out on top only out of sheer luck and environment use against Falco. Had it been an open air battle where skill was the deciding factor, Falco would have won. However, Fox decided to let Krystal go against the avian, just to see what she was like before facing off against her himself.

As the team gathered in the simulator room, Falco and Krystal got in their respective simulators, the canopy pods lifting up as the shocks came to life, hissing as thy started to lift the heavy simulators. A screen on the far wall came down, showing the views that both Falco and Krystal were seeing, as well as status readouts for all aspects of their virtual fighters. Fox moved forward to the laptop, typing in a few commands and powering up the communicator.

Both Falco and Krystal had a holographic bar above their control panels, and they both flickered to life, showing Fox. The vulpine began to speak, telling them what the rules were. "Alright, Krystal, if you can beat Falco in this dogfight, you'll move on to me. If you fail, you'll continue to fight against Falco until you can win. Both your ships have twin lasers. Shields are at full power. No nova bombs are present in either ships bomb bay. You're both on equal footing here, technologically speaking. However, Falco has far more experience and he's naturally better with the Arwing, due to his avian heritage. Krystal, however, has the gift of telepathy. She can read you like a book Falco, so be careful. I want both of you doing your best, alright? This is a one ship battle, meaning if you get shot down, you lose. This battle is set in orbit over a virtual Corneria. The planet in this simulation is the exact same as our Corneria, but there are no signs of life on it. Either stay in orbit or go down to the planet and fight there. Anything is free here, now begin!"

The communication closed. Krystal looked up at her canopy glass, seeing a bright blue light in the distance. Falco had gunned his boosters almost immediately and was baring down on Krystal at a high rate of speed. He was still several hundred kilometers away, but with the Arwing on full burn, he'd be on her in seconds if she didn't do something. The vixen remembered what Slippy said, and tried to remember how to reroute power between her forward, side, and rear shield projectors. Fumbling a bit as her furry blue digits tapped across the control panel, she rerouted all shielding power to her forward shield projectors and decided to play Falco's little game.

Her holographic communications bar lit up and the blue falcon's face appeared, a blue glow glaring at her from behind his head. "Look at that, little Krystal's gonna play chicken. Don't drop out Krystal." He said, a hint of challenge and taunting in his voice as the channel closed again.

Krystal instinctively bared her fangs, growling a bit as she pushed her throttle to the maximum. The target in front of her was quickly growing, and the weapons readout showed he was almost in range.

Fox could see and hear everything. The display was split in half, allowing him to see Krystal's view on one side, as well as her comm portrait that showed her face. Falco had the same layout on the opposite side. Looking back and forth between them, he could tell that Krystal was taking the falcon's bait. "Krystal" he spoke once more into the communicator. "Don't let him anger you. If you lose control of your emotions in the cockpit, you're as good as dead. Falco knows this." He saw Krystal's fangs bared at the Arwing in front of her, and on Falco's side, he saw the avian grinning. His plan was working.

Krystal saw the distance indicator flash, meaning she was in range. She hammered down on the firing studs repeatedly, sending twin bolts of green laser fire at the ace pilot in front of her. Falco went into an aileron roll, deflecting the shots and allowing him to release his own stream of fire. The lances shot towards Krystal at high speed, and at the distance they were at, she couldn't evade.

Jerking her right paw to the left, she went into an aileron roll much like Falco had, reflecting his shots. She banked right, as did Falco, and time slowed down as they passed each other. Krystal looked up through the top of her canopy, seeing Falco do the same, but he gave her a grin, remaining as cocky as ever in the cockpit of his fighter.

Time returned to normal and the two fighters shot past each other. Krystal knew the falcon was going to tail her, and decided to head planet-side and try to lost him in the jungle of struts on the southern side of the planet that held up the city of Peregrine. The low altitude would effectively cut her radar signature in half, and all the titanium struts would scramble the other Arwings' radar. Unfortunately, it would do the same to her, but she would be able to keep his position in her mind with the telepathy.

A cone of fire coated the nose of her craft, the airframe beginning to shake under the stress of atmospheric entry. Krystal tapped a few commands in on her console, switching her engine output to give her maximum compatibility in the atmosphere. She heard the sound of her G-diffuser manifolds adjusting to compensate for the added gravity around Corneria.

Krystal angled her heading south, pushing the accelerator strip forward as her speed increased up to mach three. The towering city of Peregrine appeared in the distance, the steel struts under the city managing to stay strong even though they were buffeted by one of the strongest current zones on the planet. Krystal rolled her Arwing and dropped toward the surface, aiming straight for the steel jungle.

_Falco watched the other Arwing dive into the_ support structure of Peregrine city. He circled about lazily, waiting for her to come out. He knew she was baiting him. He knew that she was smart enough to know the radar signatures in there would be useless. The ace cleared his mind so she wouldn't be able to read it and dove in after her.

Currently, Peregrine City was on the dark side of the planet, and Falco squinted to make out anything. He could see a field of blue lights, growing brighter as it moved to the center of the field. He typed in a command on his console, causing a hood to cover his engine nacelles and allowing a few slits on either side of the Arwing to open up. These slits led to heat sinks in the inner fuselage. By doing this, Falco had eliminated the problem Krystal had caused for herself. In the darkness of the night, hiding in a place that rarely got light, even in the middle of the day, and in a steel maze that reflected everything, Krystal's thruster system had given her away to the falcon.

Using docking thrusters and polarizing the outside of his canopy, as well as activating thermal sensors to see her better, Falco slowly made his way towards her, dodging the steel struts that came every now and then. He was less than three hundred meters away when Krystal's fighter was suddenly covered by a shield made of what looked to be pure energy. Falco gasped and quickly turned his fighter around, pressing forward on the boost and retracting the hood on his engines. He was too late, he had been lured into the vixen's trap.

_Krystal smirked as she saw the falcon's_ Arwing go dark. The fighter plummeted towards the thrashing sea below, disappearing under the waves as a message scrolled across her canopy. The text "SIMULATION OVER" scrolled from right to left as the view darkened and a light behind her turned on, illuminating the canopy so she could get out.

The two simulators eased down on their shocks, hydraulics hissing in protest to the load as the vixen got out. Looking across the room, she saw Falco get out, a grin on his face. Krystal smirked at the ace, winking.

Falco shook his head, rolling his eyes as he crossed his arms. Fox and Slippy moved away from the laptop in the wall. "Krystal, how did you know to do that?" Slippy asked, a little amazed that she had managed to trick the falcon.

She shrugged. "I don't really know. I've seen it happen in movies, so I decided to try it. It took my shields all the way down, but it still fried Falco's ship." She cut her eyes to Falco, still smirking.

Fox looked to Slippy, wondering what exactly she had done. Slippy guessed what he was thinking, and decided to explain. "Krystal knew Falco would follow her in. She knew the metal and the low altitude would destroy any radar traces, and she purposely left her engine manifold visible with the thrusters running hot. It attracted Falco because of how dangerous it is. Either he would chase her and out-fly her inside, or he'd hide himself and creep up on her. Either way, he'd need to get close. Krystal had spent the time supercharging her shields, and when he got close, she overloaded them, creating an electro-magnetic pulse. It completely fried Falco's ship, and even had it not, he would have needed time to reboot his computers and systems. At that altitude, even he wouldn't be able to pull out of there without crashing into a strut or the ocean."

Fox turned his gaze to Krystal and grinned. "You're getting better and better at this, Krystal. I think you'll be able to outdo Falco if we get called into the battle in a few days."

Krystal nodded, her skin a bit red beneath her white facial fur. She waved her hand at him dismissively, as if waving his compliments away. "You think so? I hope I can join all of you during the battle. It should be fun!"

_Three weeks have passed since _the simulator battles that Krystal held against the Star Fox team, and Corneria's 5th Fleet had been gearing up for what may be the final battle against Andross's forces. They had continued to amass in orbit around Fichina, likely using it as a staging area far enough from Corneria to make it difficult in tracking their movements, but close enough for a practical quick assault force.

Fox had spent the last three weeks checking to make sure the Star Fox team assets were ready for battle. He had visited the Pomona Dry Docks to check on the status of the Great Fox, which had since been heavily redesigned by a team of Arspace Dynamic's best maintenance crews. It was costing the vulpine a fortune, but it could mean the difference between life and death for him and his team. It had been made sleeker and stronger, and the plasma boosters had been completely redesigned. New plasma cannons had been put above the flight deck, allowing the dreadnought a huge increase in firepower from what it had held in the Lylat Wars. New Arwings and Landmasters had been added to the ship's inventory, and consumables, weaponry, and other supplies had been sent in as well. The Great Fox was ready for anything now.

Fox spent the rest of his time training his team and memorizing the battle plan as needed, and he was ready for anything that Andrew Oikonny could throw at him. Setting the papers down on his desk and stretching, he got up from his desk, rubbing his eyes. He had spent the last hour in his office, reading over the plans. It was still early, and he had woken up before the sun rose. The battle was set to commence within a few hours, and Fox was just making last minute checks on everything.

The team already knew what to expect, and almost at the same time, three separate alarms went off, ringing throughout the Star Fox household as Krystal, Slippy, and Falco were all awakened for the battle at hand.

Fox heard two of the alarms cease their racket, and a few moments later, he heard a thump and an annoyed groaning as Falco woke up, having thrown his alarm clock to try to turn it off, but only succeeding in making it harder. Krystal and Slippy had opened their doors to see what was going on when the bird opened his own, his feathers messy and pointing in every direction as he glared at them. Falco wasn't a morning person, and it showed.

Fox was downstairs already, having made breakfast by the time the rest of the team got their showers and had put on their gear. Slippy bound down the stairs in a yellow jumpsuit, with what appeared to be a tool belt around his waist and a mobile programmer on a strap slung across his chest. As the team's mechanic, he had to be ready for anything. Fox also took note of the red and white cap he wore between his eyes with the word "Slippy" written on it in faded lettering.

Krystal was next, a purple and black jumpsuit coating her own body. She had kept beads in a few strands of her hair, and she was wearing a tiara as well, but unlike most, this specific tiara held a rare gem in the center, and hung down across her forehead a bit.

Falco was last, still looking grump and annoyed, but he was up at least. The falcon wore a red jumpsuit, with armored pauldrons on his shoulders and silver boots that looked as if they came up to his upper thighs. Fox didn't understand how they were practical, but he kept his mouth shut in the face of a grumpy Falco.

Fox had finished preparing breakfast. The stereotypical smell of pancakes wafted through the air. Fox had never been a good cook, but he was able to at least make pancakes without starting a fire. Slippy usually made breakfast, but Fox had decided to do it himself this morning.

Sitting down at the table after everybody had gotten their food, Fox remembered why he had always preferred the casual flight suit and aviator jacket to the light armor that he was wearing now. He had chosen a green and red jumpsuit with a sleeveless flight jacket. It wasn't the same one he had worn during the Lylat Wars, however. This one held a blaster proof plating inside, wrapping around his body. Knee pads were another asset, along with the ammo pouch he had wrapped around his waist. Just above the pads was a blaster holster, the black M29 standard issue blaster pistol already held inside. Crimson colored boots completed the armor. Fox was the most heavily armored member of the team, despite the armor still being about the same as a Cornerian swat officer, minus the extra leg armor they usually wore.

The team ate in silence, all of them thinking about what may happen during the battle to come. Fox was the first to finish and stood, pushing his chair in and setting the plate in a dish washer. He left the washer open for the others and went to the living room, picking up the small phone and dialing a number before hearing the voice he wanted to hear.

"Pepper here." The hound's face was projected in the air above the phone's housing as the projector unit came online. Pepper would be the first to know that the Star Fox team was deploying to the battlefield.

"General, it's Fox. My team is ready to move out. We'll leave for the Great Fox within the next ten minutes and make our way to the Beltino Orbital Gate. Could you get the paperwork filed to get a dreadnought class gate opened up within twenty minutes?" He asked.

The General nodded on his end. "Consider it done, Fox. They'll be expecting you." He said, then the connection was cut as Fox put the phone back down and returned to the kitchen, seeing his team was finished. He nodded to all of them, watching them all stand up. He turned on his heel and headed for a steel door across the room.

Opening the door, he stepped inside, stepping onto a small square platform with railing on the edges for safety measures. When his team stepped onto the platform beside him, Slippy pressed a few commands in on the control panel, causing the platform to start moving diagonally and downward slowly.

When it reached the bottom, it started moving completely horizontally, picking up speed as it headed for the hangar. Everything was a blur as lights on the walls passed by. At the end of the corridor, another steel blast door began to open up, revealing a set of the redesigned Arwings. The platform continued on it's way into the hangar, allowing the team to step off and go to their respective Arwings.

Fox hopped onto the stairs that had revealed themselves by rotating out of the hull. Jumping into the cockpit, he looked over to see that everyone else had gotten in as well. Pressing a button on his control panel, he closed his canopy, the rest closing with his. "Alright, begin take off procedures. Testing communications...communications line is green. Start your engines." He heard four throaty rumbles, and then roars as the Arwings started up. Fox engaged his belly thrusters and began to hover upwards, where the ceiling above them split, allowing access to the still orange skyline. Falco waited several seconds before he followed suit, Krystal and Slippy doing the same afterward.

Fox pushed the throttle forward slightly, allowing him to pick up speed as Falco, Krystal, and Slippy thrusted forward to join him in a diamond formation as they passed over the capital. Fox grinned and saw a comm line open up. It was Falco. The bird had a smirk on his beak. "You ready, Foxie?" He asked. Fox only nodded and gripped the thruster bar as Falco did the same for the other two team members. When Falco came back up and gave Fox the thumbs up. As soon as he saw this, he jammed the throttle bar to the max, feeling the Arwing jump beneath him as the engines maxed out and went into afterburners. The other three Arwings did the same, letting the heavy fighters scream through the sky over Corneria City, likely waking up anybody within ten miles with a roar that loud. He gave the avian on his dash another grin as he pulled back on the flight stick, the orange skyline being replaced by the black void of space. In the distance, he saw a glistening cylinder, flanked by several smaller ones.

The Pomona Dry Docks were waiting, and by the time they got in range to see, the newly redesigned Great Fox was already being towed out of the docks by a set of tugs. "Krystal" Fox said. "Break off and head through the hangar bay in the front. It's already open and a force field is up. Don't worry, you'll pass through. Set down on the left side of the hangar."

Krystal nodded. Turning her stick, she broke off from the formation and did as she was told, setting down in the hangar and powering down her fighter. The canopy unsealed as Slippy came in next, setting down on the opposite side of the hangar. Then came Falco, who set down beside Slippy, and finally Fox made his way in, setting down on the left side of Krystal's Arwing.

Within a few moments of Fox's ship setting down, all of them were out of their cockpits and running for the bridge, having felt the engines start up throughout the hull. It felt as if the engines were giving off a subsonic thrum. It made them feel as if their organs were jelly and were jiggling about through their bodies. They would get used to the new plasma engines in time. As they ran through the corridor that ran along the spine of the ship, Fox caught wind of the strong antiseptic smell, as if the interior of his ship was a hospital. It stung his nose, and Fox knew it must have been affecting Krystal as well.

By the time they arrived on the bridge, Rob was already at the controls, maneuvering the dreadnought through space towards an enormous orbiting space station. "We are receiving a transmission from the Beltino Orbital Gate." The piloting droid said in his monotone.

"Put it on the big screen, Rob." Fox commanded. On the screen, a yellow and orange envelope waited to be opened. When Rob keyed the commands, the envelope opened and showed a toad much like Slippy. He wore a large set of glasses that were built for the amphibians much like himself with eyes that extended past their head a bit. An orange version of Slippy's jumpsuit covered him beneath a lab technician's coat.

"Hello, everybody!" The toad said. "I am Beltino Toad, Corneria's research director." Off to Fox's left, Slippy's mouth opened.

"Dad? You're the research director? Why didn't you tell me?" He asked.

"Well, I did...didn't I?" The older toad asked, looking as if he was trying to remember before he snapped himself out of it. "That's not important right now, Slipster." Fox suppressed a smile. It appeared as if everyone had a nickname for Slippy. "Corneria's 5th Fleet is already engaging Andross's forces over Fortuna. They'll need your help to get through this. The orbital gate is coming online and will be ready in 30 seconds. Good luck everybody!" The screen cut off and changed to the outside area.

On the camera mounted on the tip of the dreadnought, there was inky blackness for most of the screen, the slowly rotating station on the left side, and the bright blue sphere and aura that was Corneria and its atmosphere. A green light began to form in front of them, slowly growing in size until it was big enough for the Great Fox to pass through.

"Rob, all engines ahead." Fox said, feeling the subtle jump in the ship as its powerful plasma engines started working to push them ahead. Soon, the tip of the ship had dove into the green portal, and the rest of the dreadnought followed afterward, disappearing.

_ Over Fortuna, the Cornerian _fleet was already taking damage. They had lost a line of light frigates already to a stealth attack that Andrew had launched. Stealth bombers had come out of nowhere, turned, and opened fire on the frigate line with a hail of missiles. The frigates had been devastated by the uncloaked bombers. All hands had been presumed lost.

Near the center of the Cornerian fleet sat it's flagship. The _CSS Acheron_, which was one of the largest ships Corneria had ever produced,watched from the center, nestled safely behind a row of Swordsman Class battleships. On the bridge of the Acheron, Rear Admiral Leonard Hastings clenched his fist and slammed it onto his arm rest. He was a white wolf, and quick to anger. Standing up, he left his chair and went to a board where dozens, if not hundreds of red and blue holograms moved this way and that, opening fire with tiny lines that shared their color. A line of red ships appeared, and almost at the same time, a line of blue ships disappeared.

An uncharacteristic growl escaped his throat as he took one clawed digit and circled around a flotilla of destroyers, sending them to attack one of Andrews lines.

On the physical battlefield, the flotilla of Jaguar Class Destroyers throttled ahead, smashing into the line of enemy light cruisers. Opening fire as they passed through the cruiser line, several cruisers lost shielding almost immediately from the amount of firepower, beginning to take hits in their hull while the fast moving destroyers were able to jam any of the locks on them, forcing the cruiser line to use plasma cannons, which were easily dodged as the hits on the cruiser hulls threw off their aim. Within a few minutes, the hulking remains of the cruiser line floated freely through the battlefield.

The crew on the bridge of the Acheron began to cheer as the destroyers returned to formation. Suddenly, an officer on the navigation console called out. "Admiral, I'm seeing a gate transmission at the edge of the combat zone!"

Hastings left the battle-board, as some officers had called it, and went to navigation to see what the visual feed was. He saw the green lights begin as pinpricks on the screen before growing to a full sized gate. The ship's nose exited the light, and soon after, four wings and a dorsal fin materialized as well, the gate shutting behind them.

Hastings' jaw dropped open as he realized who it was. He almost ran back to his command chair and opened up a fleet wide channel. "This is Admiral Hastings. A dreadnought class vessel has just entered the battlefield behind us. All ships, prepare for a full out assault. We'll have the Star Fox team with us!" On the channel, he could hear the captains of his ships cheering and relaying the orders as well. On the battle-board, he could see the blue holograms form into pyramid that was pointing at the enemy fleet. This battle would be over quickly now.

_Fox looked over to his own battle-board_. He could see the Cornerian fleet movements. "They're ready for an assault. Rob, when we enter the rear line of the Cornerian fleet, I want you to fire the cannons into a line of ships. You'll be transferring energy from everything but the shields and life support into the guns. With power like that, we can punch a hole through the enemy fleet and give both ourselves and the fleet a way to turn the tide of this battle."

He turned to Peppy in the back. "I'll leave the rest of the strategy to you, Peppy." The elderly hare nodded, his eyes glued to the board. Typing in a few commands, the console in front of him showed the board, but it wasn't a small scale model of the battlefield. Instead, it was a 3D render drawing directly from the battle in real time, with an incredibly small delay due to the huge amounts of data that the Great Fox was receiving as it joined the Cornerian battle net, getting readings from dozens of ships.

Fox turned to the main screen once more, watching as the fleets traded fire, red and blue lasers mingling together in a flashy laser show of death. "Open a channel to the fleet commander." He ordered, Rob getting to work almost immediately. Within moments, the channel opened to show Admiral Hastings. A red line of blood trickled down from his forehead and into his left eye, staining the white fur. He had his eyes closed, and his teeth were bared a bit as he fought back another wave of pain from it, that and a splitting headache.

"Admiral Hastings here, now, to what do I owe the pleasure of the Star Fox squadron?" He asked, eying the team from his side.

Fox stepped forward. "We've been sent in as reserves. You look like you could use our help. Rob has already forwarded our battle plan to you to see if you could use it in any of your strategies. We're at your disposal, Admiral."

By then, Hastings had already looked to the side as the file came in, an ensign pulling it up for him to see, as well as the files for each member. "So." He said, looking back to them and wiping the blood from his eye. "You've joined the military, McCloud? I never thought I'd see the day...and you're a Lieutenant Colonel no less. Either way, I can use your strategy, and with firepower like that, you can punch a hole straight through their formation. I'll send the 297th squadron in behind you to keep the enemy off your tail. There's a massive ship in the back. It's not in our data base, so we're assuming it's Oikonny's flagship. I want you to go after it. On your way, take out what you can for us, but don't spend too much time on them or he'll either get away or unleash another stealth squadron. A wolf pack of frigates will follow the 297th in and provide capital ship support for you. We'll launch our assault in 10 minutes. That should give you time to get to your ships and onto the field. If there are any updates, I'll contact you. Hastings out."

The screen blacked out. Fox turned to his team. "You guys heard the Admiral. Let's go, or we'll be late." Without waiting for them, Fox immediately turned on his heel and began running, heading for the hangar bay. Since they had touched down, automated machinery had moved their Arwings from landing spots onto a set of electro-magnetic catapults that would launch them into space at their maximum speed.

A set of bridges had extended to the cockpits, allowing the pilots to jump into the craft easily. Rob's monotone voice was blaring on the speakers the entire time. As Fox closed his canopy, he once again checked the comm lines and did an abridged flight check, finishing as h heard Peppy come over the comm channel.

"Oikonny is no pushover, so be careful out there" In front of the team, the blast doors had been closed since they had left Corneria, but now they opened, a blue force field replacing it, showing the skirmish raging on, dozens of tiny dots hanging in front of the giant green sphere that was Fortuna, laser fire being traded almost constantly.

"The outcome of this battle hangs on you team...are you all ready?" Peppy paused as the bridges retracted, the ships lowering and moving forward a bit for more clearance. Particle buildup had started as the engines to the Arwings powered up, shifting into maximum thrust as they waited for launch. "Launch all ships!"

As soon as Peppy spoke his last word, the Arwings were launched forward on their railings, and within a second, they had blown clear of the catapults, their completely retracted wings struggling to open. Each fighter pulled into a tight roll that, without G-diffusers, would have immediately killed each pilot from the sheer force.

The wings popped loose form the hull, allowing them to accelerate even further, coming in on the rear line of the Cornerian fleet in only moments. Behind them, the Great Fox's engines had flared, and it was moving into position where it would sit just beneath the Acheron.

Fox and the other Arwings took a delta formation just as several other fighters joined on their wings. They were the ships from before, the F-40's. Again, there was one odd ship with the fox head silhouette and the five point star. It had to be General Ballard, but generals never went into battle, not in something like this, especially not directly into combat unless he was behind the six inch thick titanium armor of a battlecruiser. Either way, all of the ships also had the squadron insignia of the 297th.

The ships slowed down, hovering in the middle of space. The Valkyries were forced to fire their docking boosters to stay in place, but the Arwings were able to use their G-diffusers in place of boosters. Fox looked over at the odd ship once more. It still had the bulky armored pieces on it. Fox wondered why, but remembered that the engines on the wings allowed it to move faster, and sheltered the thin wings from fire even further. Fox noticed something on the side of the cockpit, written in italics: _Excalibur_.

Before Fox could think into it too far, his communications bar came to life. "All ships, proceed with the assault in T- ten. As soon as the Great Fox fires, rush in to fill the hole she makes."

A few moments later, two thick, golden lances of energy shot forth, piercing through several ships and going on, looking as if they would impact the planet.

Fox didn't have the time to watch, as the allied fleet had already launched an offensive. Fox pushed his hand forward along the thruster bar, feeling resistance as his engines pushed for more and more power. The Arwings and Valkyries stayed with him, and soon, the Valkyries and the odd Excalibur dropped back, keeping their role as rear guard for the Star Fox team. Fox pulled his stick to the left, rolling through a debris field left over from the broken remains of an enemy cruiser, a hole punched through it from the bow to the stern. The Great Fox had annihilated anything its cannon fire had touched. When Fox looked closely, he could see dozens of small, ravaged bodies floating in space, lifeless.

He closed his eyes and pointed his mug forward again, making his way into the enemy lines. Fighters swarmed everywhere, both allies and enemies alike. "All ships: avoid the armada's fire, aim for Oikonny's flagship!" He ordered, rolling and avoiding a stream of lasers. He resisted the urge to chase the ship, knowing that as soon as it disappeared, the rear guard would take it out.

Ahead of him, Slippy flew into his view, flying like crazy to avoid fire from an enemy that was tailing him. Fox set his thumbs on the firing studs for his lasers and opened fire, hitting the ship in the rear and sending it spiraling out of control. Another shot took it out and made its power core overload, destroying the ship.

On the communications panel, Slippy's box showed him relaxing, the fading orange fireball behind his ship fading and leaving inky blackness on the outskirts of the box. "Thanks, Fox. I thought I was a goner!" He said, relieved.

Falco rolled his eyes, always one to cut in. "Geez, you haven't changed a bit, frog boy." Fox spotted the avian weave between a pair of frigates, tailing an enemy fighter and putting a pair of shots into it, destroying his own target now.

As soon as his eyes returned to the front, a large fighter wing was filling his view. He gasped, pulling the stick hard and rolling through, evading the enemy fighters by what seemed to be mere feet. Rob appeared on the panel next. "Cornerian fleet beginning third volley of cannon fire. Andross's ships are being destroyed one after the other."

Falco's morale skyrocketed at this news. "Press the attack, we can't give up now!" He crowed, weaving flying headfirst into an enemy fighter wing, opening fire as he went.

Krystal formed on Fox's wing just as Peppy came through with more orders. "Andross's fleet is dead ahead. Fox and Krystal, you go right. Slippy and Falco will go left. Strike...now!"

Fox and Krystal rolled to the right, a cruiser filling their view. A swarm of fighters emerged from underneath it, passing them by and heading for the Cornerian fleet. The 297th was ready, and had already opened fire, stopping the enemy wing in its tracks. Fox and Krystal inverted, their canopies next to each other as they spun together, firing on the cruiser's weak point. A few seconds of high power, sustained fire was what broke its back, and the cruiser snapped in half, life pods firing from both halves.

Fox and Krystal turned left now, the vixen breaking off from Fox. "Alright, the enemy's offensive power is down!" She cried. Fox couldn't celebrate, as a large mech dropped down in front of him, several drones circling it.

"What is that, some sort of prototype?" He asked, rolling to both evade and deflect its fire power.

"Watch out, Fox, that beam is devastating!" Peppy cried, watching the Arwings from the bridge of the Great Fox.

The vulpine rolled and deflected a final shot before releasing a stream of his own, the high powered lasers bisecting the mech and leaving it to explode in his wake.

As the team formed up into a loose formation, each a few miles from the other, Fox saw a straight shot to Oikonny's flagship. "There it is! All ships, full speed ahead!" Fox cried.

Suddenly, Slippy cut in. "Fox, look out! There's a stealth squadron ahead!" He pointed out, alarms in his cockpit blaring.

Sure enough, several stealth craft appeared, bays on their sides opening and revealing rows of missiles. "Open fire!" Fox ordered, hitting one dead center, the laser penetrating the armor and hitting the core, making quick work of one as Falco swooped in, taking out two more.

The team continued making their way to the flagship, which had begun to turn around and accelerate towards the planet.

Rob came onto the channel again. "The enemy ship is fleeing to Fortuna." He said. Fox cursed under his breath, pushing his throttle to the max again.

"Follow him into the atmosphere. He's not getting away." He said, lading the charge. "Adjust G-diffuser system output.

As Fox looked at the battle again, he saw a large ship coming up behind them. Great Fox was throttling up, its large engines propelling it to speeds unheard of in a ship her size. Peppy's face appeared on the monitor. "Last time you fought an Oikonny, you almost got killed. Great Fox would have helped you then, but she couldn't...Now, it's time to make due, and test these new guns again" Peppy said, a smile on his muzzle.

Fox grinned as each fighter took up a spot at the tip of one of the wings. The Star Fox team accelerated into the atmosphere, cones of fire appearing on the Arwings and the Great Fox's nose, as well as on the wings.

"Careful now. Oikonny seems to have fled, but he may be lying in wait for us. I want all of you to proceed with caution." He said.

Falco cut in again. "Worrying a bit much, aren'tcha gramps?" He asked. Peppy only rolled his eyes as Fox issued another order.

"Alright, let's take it in low..." He said, pushing forward on the stick. The cloud barrier was growing quickly, and it had filled his view. Soon, they would punch through it and enter the jungles where Oikonny was hiding, had he came here. "Rob, run a scan through the jungles. Anything made of titanium within 50 miles of here."

He waited as thy descended through the cloud layers, the massive engines of Great Fox managing to outrun them as she pulled up, waiting in a high altitude both until it needed to strike and to facilitate the radar scanning.

The Arwings, in a tight delta formation, dove through the atmosphere, a jungle spanning as far as the eye could see was their destination, and they wasted no time diving into it.

"Rob, find that black hearted ape's location." Fox commanded, just as a set of enemy fighters emerged from the water, opening fire on him. A double tap to the firing studs made quick work of them, sending the wreckage plummeting back into the depths.

He heard Falco's voice, as if the avian was talking to himself. "Where did that crazed chimp Oikonny go?...uh-oh, I've got bogeys on my tail, mind helping me out, Fox?"

The avian dove out of a crevice in the rocks, two enemy ships hot on his tail as he dodged through the group of giant trees in front of the vulpine. Fox hit his afterburners and got behind them, hitting one in the wing and sending it careening into a tree. The other one shimmered as it was hit in the wing as well, but the shots didn't penetrate. They left the hull blackened and charred, but the leading edges of the wings scraped the ground, sending it cartwheeling across the surface and over the edge of a cliff, dropping like a rock to the water below before exploding.

He flew over the edge of the ravine, spotting a huge hangar bay in the distance with several bays. Each one had what looked to be an anti-aircraft gun built onto a tank chassis. Fox armed a Nova Bomb and fired, sending it directly into the center. The explosion obliterated the tanks within, and left the walls of the bay scarred black from the extreme heat.

Banking right, he saw a large bridge, several more anti-aircraft tanks crossing it and bringing their guns to bear. He saw this and rolled, dropping and loosing altitude just as the air he had been in only seconds before was filling with hundreds of deadly AA rounds that would have tore through even an Arwing's shields like a hot knife through butter.

Fox dove under the bridge, cutting his forward thrusters and activating the belly jets. He quickly turned the ship around 180 degrees, hitting the forward thrusters again to stop him as he rose up above the bridge again. He nosed down, firing and raking the lasers across the bridge, decimating the tank column before turning towards a large set of blast doors at the other end.

They began to open, Krystal rolling into his view. "Look out, the enemy is waiting for us on the other side!" She cried, opening fire into the crack as the doors parted. On the other side, seven enemy ships came face to face with her laser fire, and all were obliterated as she banked left, sliding between the doors and chasing an enemy off somewhere else.

Behind the doors, a sprawling enemy base was at work, supplying fighters for the battle in orbit, as well as sending supply ships up when needed. Fox rolled over, inverting and dropping towards the base floor. He rolled again, righting himself and skimming along the floor of the base.

Hangers were opening up and revealing more of the AA tanks, as well as advanced mechs. They had the body of an attack mech, but instead of legs, they had the caterpillar treads that tanks were normally equipped with.

Fox ignored them, speeding past to a tram station, oil drums inside the trams were his target. Opening fire on them, they exploded, enveloping the tram and part of the tracks. When the fireballs died down, it revealed that the tracks were mangled, no longer usable without a complete refit.

Fox flew by, Falco, Slippy, and Krystal forming on his wings as they came to another set of blast doors, likely the exit. A pair of elevators opened up, sending two rows of eight black mechs to the surface. They were the same as before, but they were taller, faster, and stronger. Fox fired another Nova Bomb, not wanting to waste any more time on them than he had to.

When the dust settled, all of the mechs in the center had been obliterated, and a few on the outskirts were missing half of their bodies, falling over after the blast had receded, useless now.

As the doors in front of him opened, he spotted the odd looking red ship from before. Krystal gunned her thrusters. "There's Oikonny! After him!" She cried, racing ahead, forcing the rest of the team to follow.

Before they could turn into the ravine where Andrew was, a pair of golden lasers shot down, missing the rear of Andrew's ship by a hundred meters or so. "Out of the way, everybody!" Peppy shouted. Looking up, Fox could see the Great Fox diving towards the ravine.

As the ravine's walls widened and it straightened out, the Great Fox dropped in, easily dwarfing Andrew's ship. The cannons began to power up again.

Andrew's ship began to turn, performing evasive maneuvers, but it was too late. The Great Fox fired, hitting it on the side, the immense power managing to turn the ship, sending it crashing into the wall. As the ship's engines continued to push it, it began to tear off parts of the bow, severing the command bridge from the rest of the ship. The engines continued to push ahead, nosing down and into the dirt.

The Great Fox began to pull up, it's engines at max. "Get out of there, the core is about to go critical, and it'll wipe this base out and everything else within the next five miles!" Slippy explained, pulling up and chasing after the Great Fox.

"Retreat!" Fox cried, doing the same. The four Arwings raced to catch up to the mother ship, the core behind them going off. Everything but the ship in front of them disappeared, going white.

By now, they were out of range, but Fox felt as if the explosion was right behind him either way, the group of fighters and the dreadnought making it out of the atmosphere and back to the main fleet, where the Cornerian armada had since won the battle, a field of debris containing the lifeless husks of destroyed ships was being blasted to clear it out.

The Arwings flew to the front of their mother ship, taking the same schedule they had in getting landed as they had before leaving Corneria.

When they were back on the bridge, a message came through, Rob putting it up on the big screen. It was Admiral Hastings, who now had a bandage over the injury above his eye, his fur still stained red where the path of blood had run. "Good job, Star Fox team. I saw the explosion from here. I take it Oikonny is dead?" He asked.

Fox nodded. "Unless he's like his grandfather, he won't be coming back again, Admiral."

Hastings smiled a bit. "Good, good. I want your team to remain on station until this cleanup operation is done. Not many ships got away, so I'd say this is a mission success. We'll be leaving within the next two hours. Hastings out."

The screen went to black as Fox turned to his team. "Well guys, job well done." He said, grinning. "Krystal," he said, turning to her. "You did amazing for your first time." He said, congratulating her. "Like the Admiral said, we'll be heading back to Corneria with the fleet in two hours, so I'd suggest you all get comfortable."

**Woo, that was a long chapter. Longest I've ever done at 12 pages and 8800 words. I think I did good~ Sorry for the delay, I wanted to try and draw it out, and I figured I'd let the Great Fox have some fun. The aparoids won't be here this time, at least not for a while. Now, being so long, this may have some mistakes, and since my last editor kind of quit, Imma need a new one!~ Who wants to volunteer? Either way, I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter!**


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